Tenant self-service troubleshooting for a multi-tenant identity and data security management cloud service

ABSTRACT

A system provides cloud-based identity and access management. The system provides a user interface (“UI”) to a tenant of an identity-management service. The system enables diagnostics functionality for the tenant based on a user input received via the UI, where the diagnostics functionality allows for a user in the tenant to configure and receive diagnostics reports related to the identity-management service. The system then receives a request for the identity-management service, accesses a microservice based on the request, performs the identity-management service by the microservice, collects and records diagnostics information during the performing of the identity-management service, and displays the diagnostics information to the user via the UI.

CROSS REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS

This application claims priority of U.S. Provisional Patent ApplicationSer. No. 62/371,336, filed on Aug. 5, 2016, U.S. Provisional PatentApplication Ser. No. 62/376,069, filed on Aug. 17, 2016, U.S.Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 62/395,463, filed on Sep. 16,2016, and U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 62/379,823, filedon Aug. 26, 2016. The disclosures of each of the foregoing applicationsare hereby incorporated by reference.

FIELD

One embodiment is directed generally to identity management, and inparticular, to identity management in a cloud system.

BACKGROUND INFORMATION

Generally, the use of cloud-based applications (e.g., enterprise publiccloud applications, third-party cloud applications, etc.) is soaring,with access coming from a variety of devices (e.g., desktop and mobiledevices) and a variety of users (e.g., employees, partners, customers,etc.). The abundant diversity and accessibility of cloud-basedapplications has led identity management and access security to become acentral concern. Typical security concerns in a cloud environment areunauthorized access, account hijacking, malicious insiders, etc.Accordingly, there is a need for secure access to cloud-basedapplications, or applications located anywhere, regardless of from whatdevice type or by what user type the applications are accessed.

SUMMARY

One embodiment is a system that provides cloud-based identity and accessmanagement. The system provides a user interface (“UI”) to a tenant ofan identity-management service. The system enables diagnosticsfunctionality for the tenant based on a user input received via the UI,where the diagnostics functionality allows for a user in the tenant toconfigure and receive diagnostics reports related to theidentity-management service. The system then receives a request for theidentity-management service, accesses a microservice based on therequest, performs the identity-management service by the microservice,collects and records diagnostics information during the performing ofthe identity-management service, and displays the diagnosticsinformation to the user via the UI.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIGS. 1-5 are block diagrams of example embodiments that providecloud-based identity management.

FIG. 6 is a block diagram providing a system view of an embodiment.

FIG. 6A is a block diagram providing a functional view of an embodiment.

FIG. 7 is a block diagram of an embodiment that implements Cloud Gate.

FIG. 8 illustrates an example system that implements multiple tenanciesin one embodiment.

FIG. 9 is a block diagram of a network view of an embodiment.

FIG. 10 is a block diagram of a system architecture view of single signon (“SSO”) functionality in one embodiment.

FIG. 11 is a message sequence flow of SSO functionality in oneembodiment.

FIG. 12 illustrates an example of a distributed data grid in oneembodiment.

FIGS. 13-15 provide an example sequence of user interfaces (“UIs”) forenabling and accessing diagnostics functionality according to anembodiment.

FIG. 16 is a flow diagram of identity and access managementfunctionality in accordance with an embodiment.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

One embodiment provides a multi-tenant identity and data securitymanagement cloud service where each tenant (e.g., tenant administrators,development and operations (“DevOps”), etc.) may configure self-servicediagnostics/debugging. The tenant self-service diagnostics/debugging maybe configured for issues related to, for example, configurationsettings, bad data-values being passed, incorrect processes beingfollowed to achieve some functionality, etc. In one embodiment, theself-service diagnostics/debugging is provided in addition tosystem-level monitoring/troubleshooting that aims at issues with theruntime operation (e.g., slowdowns, virtual machine failures, operationfailures, etc.). Such system-level monitoring/troubleshooting mayimplement global (i.e., cross-tenant) system-level diagnostics and usemetrics/eventing/logging.

Embodiments provide an identity cloud service that implements amicroservices-based architecture and provides multi-tenant identity anddata security management and secure access to cloud-based applications.Embodiments support secure access for hybrid cloud deployments (i.e.,cloud deployments which include a combination of a public cloud and aprivate cloud). Embodiments protect applications and data both in thecloud and on-premise. Embodiments support multi-channel access via web,mobile, and application programming interfaces (“APIs”). Embodimentsmanage access for different users, such as customers, partners, andemployees. Embodiments manage, control, and audit access across thecloud as well as on-premise. Embodiments integrate with new and existingapplications and identities. Embodiments are horizontally scalable.

One embodiment is a system that implements a number of microservices ina stateless middle tier environment to provide cloud-based multi-tenantidentity and access management services. In one embodiment, eachrequested identity-management service is broken into real-time andnear-real-time tasks. The real-time tasks are handled by a microservicein the middle tier, while the near-real-time tasks are offloaded to amessage queue. Embodiments implement access tokens that are consumed bya routing tier and a middle tier to enforce a security model foraccessing the microservices. Accordingly, embodiments provide acloud-scale Identity and Access Management (“IAM”) platform based on amulti-tenant, microservices architecture.

One embodiment provides an identity cloud service that enablesorganizations to rapidly develop fast, reliable, and secure services fortheir new business initiatives. In one embodiment, the identity cloudservice provides a number of core services, each of which solving aunique challenge faced by many enterprises. In one embodiment, theidentity cloud service supports administrators in, for example, initialon-boarding/importing of users, importing groups with user members,creating/updating/disabling/enabling/deleting users,assigning/un-assigning users into/from groups,creating/updating/deleting groups, resetting passwords, managingpolicies, sending activation, etc. The identity cloud service alsosupports end users in, for example, modifying profiles, settingprimary/recovery emails, verifying emails, unlocking their accounts,changing passwords, recovering passwords in case of forgotten password,etc.

Unified Security of Access

One embodiment protects applications and data in a cloud environment aswell as in an on-premise environment. The embodiment secures access toany application from any device by anyone. The embodiment providesprotection across both environments since inconsistencies in securitybetween the two environments may result in higher risks. For example,such inconsistencies may cause a sales person to continue having accessto their Customer Relationship Management (“CRM”) account even afterthey have defected to the competition. Accordingly, embodiments extendthe security controls provisioned in the on-premise environment into thecloud environment. For example, if a person leaves a company,embodiments ensure that their accounts are disabled both on-premise andin the cloud.

Generally, users may access applications and/or data through manydifferent channels such as web browsers, desktops, mobile phones,tablets, smart watches, other wearables, etc. Accordingly, oneembodiment provides secured access across all these channels. Forexample, a user may use their mobile phone to complete a transactionthey started on their desktop.

One embodiment further manages access for various users such ascustomers, partners, employees, etc. Generally, applications and/or datamay be accessed not just by employees but by customers or third parties.Although many known systems take security measures when onboardingemployees, they generally do not take the same level of securitymeasures when giving access to customers, third parties, partners, etc.,resulting in the possibility of security breaches by parties that arenot properly managed. However, embodiments ensure that sufficientsecurity measures are provided for access of each type of user and notjust employees.

Identity Cloud Service

Embodiments provide an Identity Cloud Service (“IDCS”) that is amulti-tenant, cloud-scale, IAM platform. IDCS provides authentication,authorization, auditing, and federation. IDCS manages access to customapplications and services running on the public cloud, and on-premisesystems. In an alternative or additional embodiment, IDCS may alsomanage access to public cloud services. For example, IDCS can be used toprovide Single Sign On (“SSO”) functionality across such variety ofservices/applications/systems.

Embodiments are based on a multi-tenant, microservices architecture fordesigning, building, and delivering cloud-scale software services.Multi-tenancy refers to having one physical implementation of a servicesecurely supporting multiple customers buying that service. A service isa software functionality or a set of software functionalities (such asthe retrieval of specified information or the execution of a set ofoperations) that can be reused by different clients for differentpurposes, together with the policies that control its usage (e.g., basedon the identity of the client requesting the service). In oneembodiment, a service is a mechanism to enable access to one or morecapabilities, where the access is provided using a prescribed interfaceand is exercised consistent with constraints and policies as specifiedby the service description.

In one embodiment, a microservice is an independently deployableservice. In one embodiment, the term microservice contemplates asoftware architecture design pattern in which complex applications arecomposed of small, independent processes communicating with each otherusing language-agnostic APIs. In one embodiment, microservices aresmall, highly decoupled services and each may focus on doing a smalltask. In one embodiment, the microservice architectural style is anapproach to developing a single application as a suite of smallservices, each running in its own process and communicating withlightweight mechanisms (e.g., an Hypertext Transfer Protocol (“HTTP”)resource API). In one embodiment, microservices are easier to replacerelative to a monolithic service that performs all or many of the samefunctions. Moreover, each of the microservices may be updated withoutadversely affecting the other microservices. In contrast, updates to oneportion of a monolithic service may undesirably or unintentionallynegatively affect the other portions of the monolithic service. In oneembodiment, microservices may be beneficially organized around theircapabilities. In one embodiment, the startup time for each of acollection of microservices is much less than the startup time for asingle application that collectively performs all the services of thosemicroservices. In some embodiments, the startup time for each of suchmicroservices is about one second or less, while the startup time ofsuch single application may be about a minute, several minutes, orlonger.

In one embodiment, microservices architecture refers to a specialization(i.e., separation of tasks within a system) and implementation approachfor service oriented architectures (“SOAs”) to build flexible,independently deployable software systems. Services in a microservicesarchitecture are processes that communicate with each other over anetwork in order to fulfill a goal. In one embodiment, these servicesuse technology-agnostic protocols. In one embodiment, the services havea small granularity and use lightweight protocols. In one embodiment,the services are independently deployable. By distributingfunctionalities of a system into different small services, the cohesionof the system is enhanced and the coupling of the system is decreased.This makes it easier to change the system and add functions andqualities to the system at any time. It also allows the architecture ofan individual service to emerge through continuous refactoring, andhence reduces the need for a big up-front design and allows forreleasing software early and continuously.

In one embodiment, in the microservices architecture, an application isdeveloped as a collection of services, and each service runs arespective process and uses a lightweight protocol to communicate (e.g.,a unique API for each microservice). In the microservices architecture,decomposition of a software into individual services/capabilities can beperformed at different levels of granularity depending on the service tobe provided. A service is a runtime component/process. Each microserviceis a self-contained module that can talk to other modules/microservices.Each microservice has an unnamed universal port that can be contacted byothers. In one embodiment, the unnamed universal port of a microserviceis a standard communication channel that the microservice exposes byconvention (e.g., as a conventional HTTP port) and that allows any othermodule/microservice within the same service to talk to it. Amicroservice or any other self-contained functional module can begenerically referred to as a “service”.

Embodiments provide multi-tenant identity-management services.Embodiments are based on open standards to ensure ease of integrationwith various applications, delivering IAM capabilities throughstandards-based services.

Embodiments manage the lifecycle of user identities which entails thedetermination and enforcement of what an identity can access, who can begiven such access, who can manage such access, etc. Embodiments run theidentity-management workload in the cloud and support securityfunctionality for applications that are not necessarily in the cloud.The identity-management services provided by the embodiments may bepurchased from the cloud. For example, an enterprise may purchase suchservices from the cloud to manage their employees' access to theirapplications.

Embodiments provide system security, massive scalability, end userusability, and application interoperability. Embodiments address thegrowth of the cloud and the use of identity services by customers. Themicroservices-based foundation addresses horizontal scalabilityrequirements, while careful orchestration of the services addresses thefunctional requirements. Achieving both goals requires decomposition(wherever possible) of the business logic to achieve statelessness witheventual consistency, while much of the operational logic not subject toreal-time processing is shifted to near-real-time by offloading to ahighly scalable asynchronous event management system with guaranteeddelivery and processing. Embodiments are fully multi-tenant from the webtier to the data tier in order to realize cost efficiencies and ease ofsystem administration.

Embodiments are based on industry standards (e.g., OpenID Connect,OAuth2, Security Assertion Markup Language 2 (“SAML2”), System forCross-domain Identity Management (“SCIM”), Representational StateTransfer (“REST”), etc.) for ease of integration with variousapplications. One embodiment provides a cloud-scale API platform andimplements horizontally scalable microservices for elastic scalability.The embodiment leverages cloud principles and provides a multi-tenantarchitecture with per-tenant data separation. The embodiment furtherprovides per-tenant customization via tenant self-service. Theembodiment is available via APIs for on-demand integration with otheridentity services, and provides continuous feature release.

One embodiment provides interoperability and leverages investments inidentity management (“IDM”) functionality in the cloud and on-premise.The embodiment provides automated identity synchronization fromon-premise Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (“LDAP”) data to clouddata and vice versa. The embodiment provides a SCIM identity bus betweenthe cloud and the enterprise, and allows for different options forhybrid cloud deployments (e.g., identity federation and/orsynchronization, SSO agents, user-provisioning connectors, etc.).

Accordingly, one embodiment is a system that implements a number ofmicroservices in a stateless middle tier to provide cloud-basedmulti-tenant identity and access management services. In one embodiment,each requested identity-management service is broken into real-time andnear-real-time tasks. The real-time tasks are handled by a microservicein the middle tier, while the near-real-time tasks are offloaded to amessage queue. Embodiments implement tokens that are consumed by arouting tier to enforce a security model for accessing themicroservices. Accordingly, embodiments provide a cloud-scale IAMplatform based on a multi-tenant, microservices architecture.

Generally, known systems provide siloed access to applications providedby different environments, e.g., enterprise cloud applications, partnercloud applications, third-party cloud applications, and customerapplications. Such siloed access may require multiple passwords,different password policies, different account provisioning andde-provisioning schemes, disparate audit, etc. However, one embodimentimplements IDCS to provide unified IAM functionality over suchapplications. FIG. 1 is a block diagram 100 of an example embodimentwith IDCS 118, providing a unified identity platform 126 for onboardingusers and applications. The embodiment provides seamless user experienceacross various applications such as enterprise cloud applications 102,partner cloud applications 104, third-party cloud applications 110, andcustomer applications 112. Applications 102, 104, 110, 112 may beaccessed through different channels, for example, by a mobile phone user108 via a mobile phone 106, by a desktop computer user 116 via a browser114, etc. A web browser (commonly referred to as a browser) is asoftware application for retrieving, presenting, and traversinginformation resources on the World Wide Web. Examples of web browsersare Mozilla Firefox®, Google Chrome®, Microsoft Internet Explorer®, andApple Safari®.

IDCS 118 provides a unified view 124 of a user's applications, a unifiedsecure credential across devices and applications (via identity platform126), and a unified way of administration (via an admin console 122).IDCS services may be obtained by calling IDCS APIs 142. Such servicesmay include, for example, login/SSO services 128 (e.g., OpenID Connect),federation services 130 (e.g., SAML), token services 132 (e.g., OAuth),directory services 134 (e.g., SCIM), provisioning services 136 (e.g.,SCIM or Any Transport over Multiprotocol (“AToM”)), event services 138(e.g., REST), and role-based access control (“RBAC”) services 140 (e.g.,SCIM). IDCS 118 may further provide reports and dashboards 120 relatedto the offered services.

Integration Tools

Generally, it is common for large corporations to have an IAM system inplace to secure access to their on-premise applications. Businesspractices are usually matured and standardized around an in-house IAMsystem such as “Oracle IAM Suite” from Oracle Corp. Even small to mediumorganizations usually have their business processes designed aroundmanaging user access through a simple directory solution such asMicrosoft Active Directory (“AD”). To enable on-premise integration,embodiments provide tools that allow customers to integrate theirapplications with IDCS.

FIG. 2 is a block diagram 200 of an example embodiment with IDCS 202 ina cloud environment 208, providing integration with an AD 204 that ison-premise 206. The embodiment provides seamless user experience acrossall applications including on-premise and third-party applications, forexample, on-premise applications 218 and various applications/servicesin cloud 208 such as cloud services 210, cloud applications 212, partnerapplications 214, and customer applications 216. Cloud applications 212may include, for example, Human Capital Management (“HCM”), CRM, talentacquisition (e.g., Oracle Taleo cloud service from Oracle Corp.),Configure Price and Quote (“CPQ”), etc. Cloud services 210 may include,for example, Platform as a Service (“PaaS”), Java, database, businessintelligence (“BI”), documents, etc.

Applications 210, 212, 214, 216, 218, may be accessed through differentchannels, for example, by a mobile phone user 220 via a mobile phone222, by a desktop computer user 224 via a browser 226, etc. Theembodiment provides automated identity synchronization from on-premiseAD data to cloud data via a SCIM identity bus 234 between cloud 208 andthe enterprise 206. The embodiment further provides a SAML bus 228 forfederating authentication from cloud 208 to on-premise AD 204 (e.g.,using passwords 232).

Generally, an identity bus is a service bus for identity-relatedservices. A service bus provides a platform for communicating messagesfrom one system to another system. It is a controlled mechanism forexchanging information between trusted systems, for example, in aservice oriented architecture (“SOA”). An identity bus is a logical busbuilt according to standard HTTP-based mechanisms such as web service,web server proxies, etc. The communication in an identity bus may beperformed according to a respective protocol (e.g., SCIM, SAML, OpenIDConnect, etc.). For example, a SAML bus is an HTTP-based connectionbetween two systems for communicating messages for SAML services.Similarly, a SCIM bus is used to communicate SCIM messages according tothe SCIM protocol.

The embodiment of FIG. 2 implements an identity (“ID”) bridge 230 thatis a small binary (e.g., 1 MB in size) that can be downloaded andinstalled on-premise 206 alongside a customer's AD 204. ID Bridge 230listens to users and groups (e.g., groups of users) from theorganizational units (“OUs”) chosen by the customer and synchronizesthose users to cloud 208. In one embodiment, users' passwords 232 arenot synchronized to cloud 208. Customers can manage application accessfor users by mapping IDCS users' groups to cloud applications managed inIDCS 208. Whenever the users' group membership is changed on-premise206, their corresponding cloud application access changes automatically.

For example, an employee moving from engineering to sales can get nearinstantaneous access to the sales cloud and lose access to the developercloud. When this change is reflected in on-premise AD 204, cloudapplication access change is accomplished in near-real-time. Similarly,access to cloud applications managed in IDCS 208 is revoked for usersleaving the company. For full automation, customers may set up SSObetween on-premise AD 204 and IDCS 208 through, e.g., AD federationservice (“AD/FS”, or some other mechanism that implements SAMLfederation) so that end users can get access to cloud applications 210,212, 214, 216, and on-premise applications 218 with a single corporatepassword 332.

FIG. 3 is a block diagram 300 of an example embodiment that includes thesame components 202, 206, 208, 210, 212, 214, 216, 218, 220, 222, 224,226, 228, 234 as in FIG. 2. However, in the embodiment of FIG. 3, IDCS202 provides integration with an on-premise IDM 304 such as Oracle IDM.Oracle IDM 304 is a software suite from Oracle Corp. for providing IAMfunctionality. The embodiment provides seamless user experience acrossall applications including on-premise and third-party applications. Theembodiment provisions user identities from on-premise IDM 304 to IDCS208 via SCIM identity bus 234 between cloud 202 and enterprise 206. Theembodiment further provides SAML bus 228 (or an OpenID Connect bus) forfederating authentication from cloud 208 to on-premise 206.

In the embodiment of FIG. 3, an Oracle Identity Manager (“OIM”)Connector 302 from Oracle Corp., and an Oracle Access Manager (“OAM”)federation module 306 from Oracle Corp., are implemented as extensionmodules of Oracle IDM 304. A connector is a module that has physicalawareness about how to talk to a system. OIM is an applicationconfigured to manage user identities (e.g., manage user accounts indifferent systems based on what a user should and should not have accessto). OAM is a security application that provides access managementfunctionality such as web SSO; identity context, authentication andauthorization; policy administration; testing; logging; auditing; etc.OAM has built-in support for SAML. If a user has an account in IDCS 202,OIM connector 302 and OAM federation 306 can be used with Oracle IDM 304to create/delete that account and manage access from that account.

FIG. 4 is a block diagram 400 of an example embodiment that includes thesame components 202, 206, 208, 210, 212, 214, 216, 218, 220, 222, 224,226, 234 as in FIGS. 2 and 3. However, in the embodiment of FIG. 4, IDCS202 provides functionality to extend cloud identities to on-premiseapplications 218. The embodiment provides seamless view of the identityacross all applications including on-premise and third-partyapplications. In the embodiment of FIG. 4, SCIM identity bus 234 is usedto synchronize data in IDCS 202 with on-premise LDAP data called “CloudCache” 402. Cloud Cache 402 is disclosed in more detail below.

Generally, an application that is configured to communicate based onLDAP needs an LDAP connection. An LDAP connection may not be establishedby such application through a URL (unlike, e.g., “www.google.com” thatmakes a connection to Google) since the LDAP needs to be on a localnetwork. In the embodiment of FIG. 4, an LDAP-based application 218makes a connection to Cloud Cache 402, and Cloud Cache 402 establishes aconnection to IDCS 202 and then pulls data from IDCS 202 as it is beingrequested. The communication between IDCS 202 and Cloud Cache 402 may beimplemented according to the SCIM protocol. For example, Cloud Cache 402may use SCIM bus 234 to send a SCIM request to IDCS 202 and receivecorresponding data in return.

Generally, fully implementing an application includes building aconsumer portal, running marketing campaigns on the external userpopulation, supporting web and mobile channels, and dealing with userauthentication, sessions, user profiles, user groups, application roles,password policies, self-service/registration, social integration,identity federation, etc. Generally, application developers are notidentity/security experts. Therefore, on-demand identity-managementservices are desired.

FIG. 5 is a block diagram 500 of an example embodiment that includes thesame components 202, 220, 222, 224, 226, 234, 402, as in FIGS. 2-4.However, in the embodiment of FIG. 5, IDCS 202 provides secure identitymanagement on demand. The embodiment provides on demand integration withidentity services of IDCS 202 (e.g., based on standards such as OpenIDConnect, OAuth2, SAML2, or SCIM). Applications 505 (which may beon-premise, in a public cloud, or in a private cloud) may call identityservice APIs 504 in IDCS 202. The services provided by IDCS 202 mayinclude, for example, self-service registration 506, password management508, user profile management 510, user authentication 512, tokenmanagement 514, social integration 516, etc.

In this embodiment, SCIM identity bus 234 is used to synchronize data inIDCS 202 with data in on-premise LDAP Cloud Cache 402. Further, a “CloudGate” 502 running on a web server/proxy (e.g., NGINX, Apache, etc.) maybe used by applications 505 to obtain user web SSO and REST API securityfrom IDCS 202. Cloud Gate 502 is a component that secures access tomulti-tenant IDCS microservices by ensuring that client applicationsprovide valid access tokens, and/or users successfully authenticate inorder to establish SSO sessions. Cloud Gate 502 is further disclosedbelow. Cloud Gate 502 (enforcement point similar to webgate/webagent)enables applications running behind supported web servers to participatein SSO.

One embodiment provides SSO and cloud SSO functionality. A general pointof entry for both on-premise IAM and IDCS in many organizations is SSO.Cloud SSO enables users to access multiple cloud resources with a singleuser sign-in. Often, organizations will want to federate theiron-premise identities. Accordingly, embodiments utilize open standardsto allow for integration with existing SSO to preserve and extendinvestment (e.g., until a complete, eventual transition to an identitycloud service approach is made).

One embodiment may provide the following functionalities:

maintain an identity store to track user accounts, ownership, access,and permissions that have been authorized,

integrate with workflow to facilitate various approvals (e.g.,management, IT, human resources, legal, and compliance) needed forapplications access,

provision SaaS user accounts for selective devices (e.g., mobile andpersonal computer (“PC”)) with access to user portal containing manyprivate and public cloud resources, and

facilitate periodic management attestation review for compliance withregulations and current job responsibilities.

In addition to these functions, embodiments may further provide:

cloud account provisioning to manage account life cycle in cloudapplications,

more robust multifactor authentication (“MFA”) integration,

extensive mobile security capabilities, and

dynamic authentication options.

One embodiment provides adaptive authentication and MFA. Generally,passwords and challenge questions have been seen as inadequate andsusceptible to common attacks such as phishing. Most business entitiestoday are looking at some form of MFA to reduce risk. To be successfullydeployed, however, solutions need to be easily provisioned, maintained,and understood by the end user, as end users usually resist anythingthat interferes with their digital experience. Companies are looking forways to securely incorporate bring your own device (“BYOD”), socialidentities, remote users, customers, and contractors, while making MFAan almost transparent component of a seamless user access experience.Within an MFA deployment, industry standards such as OAuth and OpenIDConnect are essential to ensure integration of existing multifactorsolutions and the incorporation of newer, adaptive authenticationtechnology. Accordingly, embodiments define dynamic (or adaptive)authentication as the evaluation of available information (i.e., IPaddress, location, time of day, and biometrics) to prove an identityafter a user session has been initiated. With the appropriate standards(e.g., open authentication (“OATH”) and fast identity online (“FIDO”))integration and extensible identity-management framework, embodimentsprovide MFA solutions that can be adopted, upgraded, and integratedeasily within an IT organization as part of an end-to-end secure IAMdeployment. When considering MFA and adaptive policies, organizationsmust implement consistent policies across on-premise and cloudresources, which in a hybrid IDCS and on-premise IAM environmentrequires integration between systems.

One embodiment provides user provisioning and certification. Generally,the fundamental function of an IAM solution is to enable and support theentire user-provisioning life cycle. This includes providing users withthe application access appropriate for their identity and role withinthe organization, certifying that they have the correct ongoing accesspermissions (e.g., as their role or the tasks or applications usedwithin their role change over time), and promptly de-provisioning themas their departure from the organization may require. This is importantnot only for meeting various compliance requirements but also becauseinappropriate insider access is a major source of security breaches andattacks. An automated user-provisioning capability within an identitycloud solution can be important not only in its own right but also aspart of a hybrid IAM solution whereby IDCS provisioning may providegreater flexibility than an on-premise solution for transitions as acompany downsizes, upsizes, merges, or looks to integrate existingsystems with IaaS/PaaS/SaaS environments. An IDCS approach can save timeand effort in one-off upgrades and ensure appropriate integration amongnecessary departments, divisions, and systems. The need to scale thistechnology often sneaks up on corporations, and the ability to deliver ascalable IDCS capability immediately across the enterprise can providebenefits in flexibility, cost, and control.

Generally, an employee is granted additional privileges (i.e.,“privilege creep”) over the years as her/his job changes. Companies thatare lightly regulated generally lack an “attestation” process thatrequires managers to regularly audit their employees' privileges (e.g.,access to networks, servers, applications, and data) to halt or slow theprivilege creep that results in over-privileged accounts. Accordingly,one embodiment may provide a regularly conducted (at least once a year)attestation process. Further, with mergers and acquisitions, the needfor these tools and services increases exponentially as users are onSaaS systems, on-premise, span different departments, and/or are beingde-provisioned or re-allocated. The move to cloud can further confusethis situation, and things can quickly escalate beyond existing, oftenmanually managed, certification methods. Accordingly, one embodimentautomates these functions and applies sophisticated analytics to userprofiles, access history, provisioning/de-provisioning, and fine-grainedentitlements.

One embodiment provides identity analytics. Generally, the ability tointegrate identity analytics with the IAM engine for comprehensivecertification and attestation can be critical to securing anorganization's risk profile. Properly deployed identity analytics candemand total internal policy enforcement. Identity analytics thatprovide a unified single management view across cloud and on-premise aremuch needed in a proactive governance, risk, and compliance (“GRC”)enterprise environment, and can aid in providing a closed-loop processfor reducing risk and meeting compliance regulations. Accordingly, oneembodiment provides identity analytics that are easily customizable bythe client to accommodate specific industry demands and governmentregulations for reports and analysis required by managers, executives,and auditors.

One embodiment provides self-service and access request functionality toimprove the experience and efficiency of the end user and to reducecosts from help desk calls. Generally, while a number of companiesdeploy on-premise self-service access request for their employees, manyhave not extended these systems adequately outside the formal corporatewalls. Beyond employee use, a positive digital customer experienceincreases business credibility and ultimately contributes to revenueincrease, and companies not only save on customer help desk calls andcosts but also improve customer satisfaction. Accordingly, oneembodiment provides an identity cloud service environment that is basedon open standards and seamlessly integrates with existing access controlsoftware and MFA mechanisms when necessary. The SaaS delivery modelsaves time and effort formerly devoted to systems upgrades andmaintenance, freeing professional IT staff to focus on more corebusiness applications.

One embodiment provides privileged account management (“PAM”).Generally, every organization, whether using SaaS, PaaS, IaaS, oron-premise applications, is vulnerable to unauthorized privilegedaccount abuse by insiders with super-user access credentials such assystem administrators, executives, HR officers, contractors, systemsintegrators, etc. Moreover, outside threats typically first breach alow-level user account to eventually reach and exploit privileged useraccess controls within the enterprise system. Accordingly, oneembodiment provides PAM to prevent such unauthorized insider accountuse. The main component of a PAM solution is a password vault which maybe delivered in various ways, e.g., as software to be installed on anenterprise server, as a virtual appliance also on an enterprise server,as a packaged hardware/software appliance, or as part of a cloudservice. PAM functionality is similar to a physical safe used to storepasswords kept in an envelope and changed periodically, with a manifestfor signing them in and out. One embodiment allows for a passwordcheckout as well as setting time limits, forcing periodic changes,automatically tracking checkout, and reporting on all activities. Oneembodiment provides a way to connect directly through to a requestedresource without the user ever knowing the password. This capabilityalso paves the way for session management and additional functionality.

Generally, most cloud services utilize APIs and administrativeinterfaces, which provide opportunities for infiltrators to circumventsecurity. Accordingly, one embodiment accounts for these holes in PAMpractices as the move to the cloud presents new challenges for PAM. Manysmall to medium sized businesses now administer their own SaaS systems(e.g., Office 365), while larger companies increasingly have individualbusiness units spinning up their own SaaS and IaaS services. Thesecustomers find themselves with PAM capabilities within the identitycloud service solutions or from their IaaS/PaaS provider but with littleexperience in handling this responsibility. Moreover, in some cases,many different geographically dispersed business units are trying tosegregate administrative responsibilities for the same SaaSapplications. Accordingly, one embodiment allows customers in thesesituations to link existing PAM into the overall identity framework ofthe identity cloud service and move toward greater security andcompliance with the assurance of scaling to cloud load requirements asbusiness needs dictate.

API Platform

Embodiments provide an API platform that exposes a collection ofcapabilities as services. The APIs are aggregated into microservices andeach microservice provides one or more capabilities by exposing one ormore APIs. That is, each microservice may expose different types ofAPIs. In one embodiment, each microservice communicates only through itsAPIs. In one embodiment, each API may be a microservice. In oneembodiment, multiple APIs are aggregated into a service based on atarget capability to be provided by that service (e.g., OAuth, SAML,Admin, etc.). As a result, similar APIs are not exposed as separateruntime processes. The APIs are what is made available to a serviceconsumer to use the services provided by IDCS.

Generally, in the web environment of IDCS, a URL includes three parts: ahost, a microservice, and a resource (e.g., host/microservice/resource).In one embodiment, the microservice is characterized by having aspecific URL prefix, e.g., “host/oauth/v1” where the actual microserviceis “oauth/v1”, and under “oauth/v1” there are multiple APIs, e.g., anAPI to request tokens: “host/oauth/v1/token”, an API to authenticate auser: “host/oauth/v1/authorize”, etc. That is, the URL implements amicroservice, and the resource portion of the URL implements an API.Accordingly, multiple APIs are aggregated under the same microservice,and each request includes a call to an API that identifies anidentity-management service (e.g., request a token, authenticate a user,etc.) and a microservice (e.g., OAuth) configured to perform theidentity-management service.

In one embodiment, the host portion of the URL identifies a tenant(e.g., https://tenant3.identity.oraclecloud.com:/oauth/v1/token”). Inone embodiment, the host portion of the URL identifies a tenancy of aresource related to the request.

Configuring applications that integrate with external services with thenecessary endpoints and keeping that configuration up to date istypically a challenge. To meet this challenge, embodiments expose apublic discovery API at a well-known location from where applicationscan discover the information about IDCS they need in order to consumeIDCS APIs. In one embodiment, two discovery documents are supported:IDCS Configuration (which includes IDCS, SAML, SCIM, OAuth, and OpenIDConnect configuration, at e.g.,<IDCS-URL>/.well-known/idcs-configuration), and Industry-standard OpenIDConnect Configuration (at, e.g.,<IDCS-URL>/.well-known/openid-configuration). Applications can retrievediscovery documents by being configured with a single IDCS URL.

FIG. 6 is a block diagram providing a system view 600 of IDCS in oneembodiment. In FIG. 6, any one of a variety of applications/services 602may make HTTP calls to IDCS APIs to use IDCS services. Examples of suchapplications/services 602 are web applications, native applications(e.g., applications that are built to run on a specific operatingsystem, such as Windows applications, iOS applications, Androidapplications, etc.), web services, customer applications, partnerapplications, or any services provided by a public cloud, such asSoftware as a Service (“SaaS”), PaaS, and Infrastructure as a Service(“IaaS”).

In one embodiment, the HTTP requests of applications/services 602 thatrequire IDCS services go through an Oracle Public Cloud BIG-IP appliance604 and an IDCS BIG-IP appliance 606 (or similar technologies such as aLoad Balancer, or a component called a Cloud Load Balancer as a Service(“LBaaS”) that implements appropriate security rules to protect thetraffic). However, the requests can be received in any manner. At IDCSBIG-IP appliance 606 (or, as applicable, a similar technology such as aLoad Balancer or a Cloud LBaaS), a cloud provisioning engine 608performs tenant and service orchestration. In one embodiment, cloudprovisioning engine 608 manages internal security artifacts associatedwith a new tenant being on-boarded into the cloud or a new serviceinstance purchased by a customer.

The HTTP requests are then received by an IDCS web-routing tier 610 thatimplements a security gate (i.e., Cloud Gate) and provides servicerouting and microservices registration and discovery 612. Depending onthe service requested, the HTTP request is forwarded to an IDCSmicroservice in the IDCS middle tier 614. IDCS microservices processexternal and internal HTTP requests. IDCS microservices implementplatform services and infrastructure services. IDCS platform servicesare separately deployed Java-based runtime services implementing thebusiness of IDCS. IDCS infrastructure services are separately deployedruntime services providing infrastructure support for IDCS. IDCS furtherincludes infrastructure libraries that are common code packaged asshared libraries used by IDCS services and shared libraries.Infrastructure services and libraries provide supporting capabilities asrequired by platform services for implementing their functionality.

Platform Services

In one embodiment, IDCS supports standard authentication protocols,hence IDCS microservices include platform services such as OpenIDConnect, OAuth, SAML2, System for Cross-domain Identity Management++(“SCIM++”), etc.

The OpenID Connect platform service implements standard OpenID ConnectLogin/Logout flows. Interactive web-based and native applicationsleverage standard browser-based OpenID Connect flow to request userauthentication, receiving standard identity tokens that are JavaScriptObject Notation (“JSON”) Web Tokens (“JWTs”) conveying the user'sauthenticated identity. Internally, the runtime authentication model isstateless, maintaining the user's authentication/session state in theform of a host HTTP cookie (including the JWT identity token). Theauthentication interaction initiated via the OpenID Connect protocol isdelegated to a trusted SSO service that implements the user login/logoutceremonies for local and federated logins. Further details of thisfunctionality are disclosed below with reference to FIGS. 10 and 11. Inone embodiment, OpenID Connect functionality is implemented accordingto, for example, OpenID Foundation standards.

The OAuth2 platform service provides token authorization services. Itprovides a rich API infrastructure for creating and validating accesstokens conveying user rights to make API calls. It supports a range ofuseful token grant types, enabling customers to securely connect clientsto their services. It implements standard 2-legged and 3-legged OAuth2token grant types. Support for OpenID Connect (“OIDC”) enables compliantapplications (OIDC relaying parties (“RP”s)) to integrate with IDCS asthe identity provider (OIDC OpenID provider (“OP”)). Similarly, theintegration of IDCS as OIDC RP with social OIDC OP (e.g., Facebook,Google, etc.) enables customers to allow social identities policy-basedaccess to applications. In one embodiment, OAuth functionality isimplemented according to, for example, Internet Engineering Task Force(“IETF”), Request for Comments (“RFC”) 6749.

The SAML2 platform service provides identity-federation services. Itenables customers to set up federation agreements with their partnersbased on SAML identity provider (“IDP”) and SAML service provider (“SP”)relationship models. In one embodiment, the SAML2 platform serviceimplements standard SAML2 Browser POST Login and Logout Profiles. In oneembodiment, SAML functionality is implemented according to, for example,IETF, RFC 7522.

SCIM is an open standard for automating the exchange of user-identityinformation between identity domains or information technology (“IT”)systems, as provided by, e.g., IETF, RFCs 7642, 7643, 7644. The SCIM++platform service provides identity administration services and enablescustomers to access IDP features of IDCS. The administration servicesexpose a set of stateless REST interfaces (i.e., APIs) that coveridentity lifecycle, password management, group management, etc.,exposing such artifacts as web-accessible resources.

All IDCS configuration artifacts are resources, and the APIs of theadministration services allow for managing IDCS resources (e.g., users,roles, password policies, applications, SAML/OIDC identity providers,SAML service providers, keys, certifications, notification templates,etc.). Administration services leverage and extend the SCIM standard toimplement schema-based REST APIs for Create, Read, Update, Delete, andQuery (“CRUDQ”) operations on all IDCS resources. Additionally, allinternal resources of IDCS used for administration and configuration ofIDCS itself are exposed as SCIM-based REST APIs. Access to the identitystore 618 is isolated to the SCIM++ API.

In one embodiment, for example, the SCIM standard is implemented tomanage the users and groups resources as defined by the SCIMspecifications, while SCIM++ is configured to support additional IDCSinternal resources (e.g., password policies, roles, settings, etc.)using the language defined by the SCIM standard.

The Administration service supports the SCIM 2.0 standard endpoints withthe standard SCIM 2.0 core schemas and schema extensions where needed.In addition, the Administration service supports several SCIM 2.0compliant endpoint extensions to manage other IDCS resources, forexample, Users, Groups, Applications, Settings, etc. The Administrationservice also supports a set of remote procedure call-style (“RPC-style”)REST interfaces that do not perform CRUDQ operations but instead providea functional service, for example, “UserPasswordGenerator,”“UserPasswordValidator,” etc.

IDCS Administration APIs use the OAuth2 protocol for authentication andauthorization. IDCS supports common OAuth2 scenarios such as scenariosfor web server, mobile, and JavaScript applications. Access to IDCS APIsis protected by access tokens. To access IDCS Administration APIs, anapplication needs to be registered as an OAuth2 client or an IDCSApplication (in which case the OAuth2 client is created automatically)through the IDCS Administration console and be granted desired IDCSAdministration Roles. When making IDCS Administration API calls, theapplication first requests an access token from the IDCS OAuth2 Service.After acquiring the token, the application sends the access token to theIDCS API by including it in the HTTP authorization header. Applicationscan use IDCS Administration REST APIs directly, or use an IDCS JavaClient API Library.

Infrastructure Services

The IDCS infrastructure services support the functionality of IDCSplatform services. These runtime services include an event processingservice (for asynchronously processing user notifications, applicationsubscriptions, and auditing to database); a job-scheduler service (forscheduling and executing jobs, e.g., executing immediately or at aconfigured time long-running tasks that do not require userintervention); a cache management service; a storage management service(for integrating with a public cloud storage service); a reports service(for generating reports and dashboards); an SSO service (for managinginternal user authentication and SSO); a user interface (“UI”) service(for hosting different types of UI clients); and a service managerservice. Service manager is an internal interface between the OraclePublic Cloud and IDCS. Service manager manages commands issued by theOracle Public Cloud, where the commands need to be implemented by IDCS.For example, when a customer signs up for an account in a cloud storebefore they can buy something, the cloud sends a request to IDCS askingto create a tenant. In this case, service manager implements the cloudspecific operations that the cloud expects IDCS to support.

An IDCS microservice may call another IDCS microservice through anetwork interface (i.e., an HTTP request).

In one embodiment, IDCS may also provide a schema service (or apersistence service) that allows for using a database schema. A schemaservice allows for delegating the responsibility of managing databaseschemas to IDCS. Accordingly, a user of IDCS does not need to manage adatabase since there is an IDCS service that provides thatfunctionality. For example, the user may use the database to persistschemas on a per tenant basis, and when there is no more space in thedatabase, the schema service will manage the functionality of obtaininganother database and growing the space so that the users do not have tomanage the database themselves.

IDCS further includes data stores which are data repositoriesrequired/generated by IDCS, including an identity store 618 (storingusers, groups, etc.), a global database 620 (storing configuration dataused by IDCS to configure itself), an operational schema 622 (providingper tenant schema separation and storing customer data on a per customerbasis), an audit schema 624 (storing audit data), a caching cluster 626(storing cached objects to speed up performance), etc. All internal andexternal IDCS consumers integrate with the identity services overstandards-based protocols. This enables use of a domain name system(“DNS”) to resolve where to route requests, and decouples consumingapplications from understanding the internal implementation of identityservices.

Real-Time and Near-Real-Time Tasks

IDCS separates the tasks of a requested service into synchronousreal-time and asynchronous near-real-time tasks, where real-time tasksinclude only the operations that are needed for the user to proceed. Inone embodiment, a real-time task is a task that is performed withminimal delay, and a near-real-time task is a task that is performed inthe background without the user having to wait for it. In oneembodiment, a real-time task is a task that is performed withsubstantially no delay or with negligible delay, and appears to a useras being performed almost instantaneously.

The real-time tasks perform the main business functionality of aspecific identity service. For example, when requesting a login service,an application sends a message to authenticate a user's credentials andget a session cookie in return. What the user experiences is logginginto the system. However, several other tasks may be performed inconnection with the user's logging in, such as validating who the useris, auditing, sending notifications, etc. Accordingly, validating thecredentials is a task that is performed in real-time so that the user isgiven an HTTP cookie to start a session, but the tasks related tonotifications (e.g., sending an email to notify the creation of anaccount), audits (e.g., tracking/recording), etc., are near-real-timetasks that can be performed asynchronously so that the user can proceedwith least delay.

When an HTTP request for a microservice is received, the correspondingreal-time tasks are performed by the microservice in the middle tier,and the remaining near-real-time tasks such as operational logic/eventsthat are not necessarily subject to real-time processing are offloadedto message queues 628 that support a highly scalable asynchronous eventmanagement system 630 with guaranteed delivery and processing.Accordingly, certain behaviors are pushed from the front end to thebackend to enable IDCS to provide high level service to the customers byreducing latencies in response times. For example, a login process mayinclude validation of credentials, submission of a log report, updatingof the last login time, etc., but these tasks can be offloaded to amessage queue and performed in near-real-time as opposed to real-time.

In one example, a system may need to register or create a new user. Thesystem calls an IDCS SCIM API to create a user. The end result is thatwhen the user is created in identity store 618, the user gets anotification email including a link to reset their password. When IDCSreceives a request to register or create a new user, the correspondingmicroservice looks at configuration data in the operational database(located in global database 620 in FIG. 6) and determines that the“create user” operation is marked with a “create user” event which isidentified in the configuration data as an asynchronous operation. Themicroservice returns to the client and indicates that the creation ofthe user is done successfully, but the actual sending of thenotification email is postponed and pushed to the backend. In order todo so, the microservice uses a messaging API 616 to queue the message inqueue 628 which is a store.

In order to dequeue queue 628, a messaging microservice, which is aninfrastructure microservice, continually runs in the background andscans queue 628 looking for events in queue 628. The events in queue 628are processed by event subscribers 630 such as audit, user notification,application subscriptions, data analytics, etc. Depending on the taskindicated by an event, event subscribers 630 may communicate with, forexample, audit schema 624, a user notification service 634, an identityevent subscriber 632, etc. For example, when the messaging microservicefinds the “create user” event in queue 628, it executes thecorresponding notification logic and sends the corresponding email tothe user.

In one embodiment, queue 628 queues operational events published bymicroservices 614 as well as resource events published by APIs 616 thatmanage IDCS resources.

IDCS uses a real-time caching structure to enhance system performanceand user experience. The cache itself may also be provided as amicroservice. IDCS implements an elastic cache cluster 626 that grows asthe number of customers supported by IDCS scales. Cache cluster 626 maybe implemented with a distributed data grid which is disclosed in moredetail below. In one embodiment, write-only resources bypass cache.

In one embodiment, IDCS runtime components publish health andoperational metrics to a public cloud monitoring module 636 thatcollects such metrics of a public cloud such as Oracle Public Cloud fromOracle Corp.

In one embodiment, IDCS may be used to create a user. For example, aclient application 602 may issue a REST API call to create a user. Adminservice (a platform service in 614) delegates the call to a user manager(an infrastructure library/service in 614), which in turn creates theuser in the tenant-specific ID store stripe in ID store 618. On “UserCreate Success”, the user manager audits the operation to the audittable in audit schema 624, and publishes an“identity.user.create.success” event to message queue 628. Identitysubscriber 632 picks up the event and sends a “Welcome” email to thenewly created user, including newly created login details.

In one embodiment, IDCS may be used to grant a role to a user, resultingin a user-provisioning action. For example, a client application 602 mayissue a REST API call to grant a user a role. Admin service (a platformservice in 614) delegates the call to a role manager (an infrastructurelibrary/service in 614), who grants the user a role in thetenant-specific ID store stripe in ID store 618. On “Role GrantSuccess”, the role manager audits the operations to the audit table inaudit schema 624, and publishes an “identity.user.role.grant.success”event to message queue 628. Identity subscriber 632 picks up the eventand evaluates the provisioning grant policy. If there is an activeapplication grant on the role being granted, a provisioning subscriberperforms some validation, initiates account creation, calls out thetarget system, creates an account on the target system, and marks theaccount creation as successful. Each of these functionalities may resultin publishing of corresponding events, such as“prov.account.create.initiate”, “prov.target.create.initiate”,“prov.target.create.success”, or “prov.account.create.success”. Theseevents may have their own business metrics aggregating number ofaccounts created in the target system over the last N days.

In one embodiment, IDCS may be used for a user to log in. For example, aclient application 602 may use one of the supported authentication flowsto request a login for a user. IDCS authenticates the user, and uponsuccess, audits the operation to the audit table in audit schema 624.Upon failure, IDCS audits the failure in audit schema 624, and publishes“login.user.login.failure” event in message queue 628. A loginsubscriber picks up the event, updates its metrics for the user, anddetermines if additional analytics on the user's access history need tobe performed.

Accordingly, by implementing “inversion of control” functionality (e.g.,changing the flow of execution to schedule the execution of an operationat a later time so that the operation is under the control of anothersystem), embodiments enable additional event queues and subscribers tobe added dynamically to test new features on a small user sample beforedeploying to broader user base, or to process specific events forspecific internal or external customers.

Stateless Functionality

IDCS microservices are stateless, meaning the microservices themselvesdo not maintain state. “State” refers to the data that an applicationuses in order to perform its capabilities. IDCS provides multi-tenantfunctionality by persisting all state into tenant-specific repositoriesin the IDCS data tier. The middle tier (i.e., the code that processesthe requests) does not have data stored in the same location as theapplication code. Accordingly, IDCS is highly scalable, bothhorizontally and vertically.

To scale vertically (or scale up/down) means to add resources to (orremove resources from) a single node in a system, typically involvingthe addition of CPUs or memory to a single computer. Verticalscalability allows an application to scale up to the limits of itshardware. To scale horizontally (or scale out/in) means to add morenodes to (or remove nodes from) a system, such as adding a new computerto a distributed software application. Horizontal scalability allows anapplication to scale almost infinitely, bound only by the amount ofbandwidth provided by the network.

Stateless-ness of the middle tier of IDCS makes it horizontally scalablejust by adding more CPUs, and the IDCS components that perform the workof the application do not need to have a designated physicalinfrastructure where a particular application is running. Stateless-nessof the IDCS middle tier makes IDCS highly available, even when providingidentity services to a very large number of customers/tenants. Each passthrough an IDCS application/service is focused on CPU usage only toperform the application transaction itself but not use hardware to storedata. Scaling is accomplished by adding more slices when the applicationis running, while data for the transaction is stored at a persistencelayer where more copies can be added when needed.

The IDCS web tier, middle tier, and data tier can each scaleindependently and separately. The web tier can be scaled to handle moreHTTP requests. The middle tier can be scaled to support more servicefunctionality. The data tier can be scaled to support more tenants.

IDCS Functional View

FIG. 6A is an example block diagram 600 b of a functional view of IDCSin one embodiment. In block diagram 600 b, the IDCS functional stackincludes services, shared libraries, and data stores. The servicesinclude IDCS platform services 640 b, IDCS premium services 650 b, andIDCS infrastructure services 662 b. In one embodiment, IDCS platformservices 640 b and IDCS premium services 650 b are separately deployedJava-based runtime services implementing the business of IDCS, and IDCSinfrastructure services 662 b are separately deployed runtime servicesproviding infrastructure support for IDCS. The shared libraries includeIDCS infrastructure libraries 680 b which are common code packaged asshared libraries used by IDCS services and shared libraries. The datastores are data repositories required/generated by IDCS, includingidentity store 698 b, global configuration 700 b, message store 702 b,global tenant 704 b, personalization settings 706 b, resources 708 b,user transient data 710 b, system transient data 712 b, per-tenantschemas (managed ExaData) 714 b, operational store (not shown), cachingstore (not shown), etc.

In one embodiment, IDCS platform services 640 b include, for example,OpenID Connect service 642 b, OAuth2 service 644 b, SAML2 service 646 b,and SCIM++ service 648 b. In one embodiment, IDCS premium servicesinclude, for example, cloud SSO and governance 652 b, enterprisegovernance 654 b, AuthN broker 656 b, federation broker 658 b, andprivate account management 660 b.

IDCS infrastructure services 662 b and IDCS infrastructure libraries 680b provide supporting capabilities as required by IDCS platform services640 b to do their work. In one embodiment, IDCS infrastructure services662 b include job scheduler 664 b, UI 666 b, SSO 668 b, reports 670 b,cache 672 b, storage 674 b, service manager 676 b (public cloudcontrol), and event processor 678 b (user notifications, appsubscriptions, auditing, data analytics). In one embodiment, IDCSinfrastructure libraries 680 b include data manager APIs 682 b, eventAPIs 684 b, storage APIs 686 b, authentication APIs 688 b, authorizationAPIs 690 b, cookie APIs 692 b, keys APIs 694 b, and credentials APIs 696b. In one embodiment, cloud compute service 602 b (internal Nimbula)supports the function of IDCS infrastructure services 662 b and IDCSinfrastructure libraries 680 b.

In one embodiment, IDCS provides various Uls 602 b for a consumer ofIDCS services, such as customer end user UI 604 b, customer admin UI 606b, DevOps admin UI 608 b, and login UI 610 b. In one embodiment, IDCSallows for integration 612 b of applications (e.g., customer apps 614 b,partner apps 616 b, and cloud apps 618 b) and firmware integration 620b. In one embodiment, various environments may integrate with IDCS tosupport their access control needs. Such integration may be provided by,for example, identity bridge 622 b (providing AD integration, WNA, andSCIM connector), Apache agent 624 b, or MSFT agent 626 b.

In one embodiment, internal and external IDCS consumers integrate withthe identity services of IDCS over standards-based protocols 628 b, suchas OpenID Connect 630 b, OAuth2 632 b, SAML2 634 b, SCIM 636 b, andREST/HTTP 638 b. This enables use of a domain name system (“DNS”) toresolve where to route requests, and decouples the consumingapplications from understanding internal implementation of the identityservices.

The IDCS functional view in FIG. 6A further includes public cloudinfrastructure services that provide common functionality that IDCSdepends on for user notifications (cloud notification service 718 b),file storage (cloud storage service 716 b), and metrics/alerting forDevOps (cloud monitoring service (EM) 722 b and cloud metrics service(Graphite) 720 b).

Cloud Gate

In one embodiment, IDCS implements a “Cloud Gate” in the web tier. CloudGate is a web server plugin that enables web applications to externalizeuser SSO to an identity-management system (e.g., IDCS), similar toWebGate or WebAgent technologies that work with enterprise IDM stacks.Cloud Gate acts as a security gatekeeper that secures access to IDCSAPIs. In one embodiment, Cloud Gate is implemented by a web/proxy serverplugin that provides a web Policy Enforcement Point (“PEP”) forprotecting HTTP resources based on OAuth.

FIG. 7 is a block diagram 700 of an embodiment that implements a CloudGate 702 running in a web server 712 and acting as a Policy EnforcementPoint (“PEP”) configured to integrate with IDCS Policy Decision Point(“PDP”) using open standards (e.g., OAuth2, OpenID Connect, etc.) whilesecuring access to web browser and REST API resources 714 of anapplication. In some embodiments, the PDP is implemented at OAuth and/orOpenID Connect microservices 704. For example, when a user browser 706sends a request to IDCS for a login of a user 710, a corresponding IDCSPDP validates the credentials and then decides whether the credentialsare sufficient (e.g., whether to request for further credentials such asa second password). In the embodiment of FIG. 7, Cloud Gate 702 may actboth as the PEP and as the PDP since it has a local policy.

As part of one-time deployment, Cloud Gate 702 is registered with IDCSas an OAuth2 client, enabling it to request OIDC and OAuth2 operationsagainst IDCS. Thereafter, it maintains configuration information aboutan application's protected and unprotected resources, subject to requestmatching rules (how to match URLs, e.g., with wild cards, regularexpressions, etc.). Cloud Gate 702 can be deployed to protect differentapplications having different security policies, and the protectedapplications can be multi-tenant.

During browser-based user access, Cloud Gate 702 acts as an OIDC RP 718initiating a user-authentication flow. If user 710 has no valid localuser session, Cloud Gate 702 re-directs the user to the SSO microserviceand participates in the OIDC “Authorization Code” flow with the SSOmicroservice. The flow concludes with the delivery of a JWT as anidentity token. Cloud Gate 708 validates the JWT (e.g., looks atsignature, expiration, destination/audience, etc.) and issues a localsession cookie for user 710. It acts as a session manager 716 securingweb browser access to protected resources and issuing, updating, andvalidating the local session cookie. It also provides a logout URL forremoval of its local session cookie.

Cloud Gate 702 also acts as an HTTP Basic Auth authenticator, validatingHTTP Basic Auth credentials against IDCS. This behavior is supported inboth session-less and session-based (local session cookie) modes. Noserver-side IDCS session is created in this case.

During programmatic access by REST API clients 708, Cloud Gate 702 mayact as an OAuth2 resource server/filter 720 for an application'sprotected REST APIs 714. It checks for the presence of a request with anauthorization header and an access token. When client 708 (e.g., mobile,web apps, JavaScript, etc.) presents an access token (issued by IDCS) touse with a protected REST API 714, Cloud Gate 702 validates the accesstoken before allowing access to the API (e.g., signature, expiration,audience, etc.). The original access token is passed along unmodified.

Generally, OAuth is used to generate either a client identitypropagation token (e.g., indicating who the client is) or auser-identity propagation token (e.g., indicating who the user is). Inthe embodiments, the implementation of OAuth in Cloud Gate is based on aJWT which defines a format for web tokens, as provided by, e.g., IETF,RFC 7519.

When a user logs in, a JWT is issued. The JWT is signed by IDCS andsupports multi-tenant functionality in IDCS. Cloud Gate validates theJWT issued by IDCS to allow for multi-tenant functionality in IDCS.Accordingly, IDCS provides multi-tenancy in the physical structure aswell as in the logical business process that underpins the securitymodel.

Tenancy Types

IDCS specifies three types of tenancies: customer tenancy, clienttenancy, and user tenancy. Customer or resource tenancy specifies whothe customer of IDCS is (i.e., for whom is the work being performed).Client tenancy specifies which client application is trying to accessdata (i.e., what application is doing the work). User tenancy specifieswhich user is using the application to access data (i.e., by whom is thework being performed). For example, when a professional services companyprovides system integration functionality for a warehouse club and usesIDCS for providing identity management for the warehouse club systems,user tenancy corresponds to the professional services company, clienttenancy is the application that is used to provide system integrationfunctionality, and customer tenancy is the warehouse club.

Separation and identification of these three tenancies enablesmulti-tenant functionality in a cloud-based service. Generally, foron-premise software that is installed on a physical machine on-premise,there is no need to specify three different tenancies since a user needsto be physically on the machine to log in. However, in a cloud-basedservice structure, embodiments use tokens to determine who is using whatapplication to access which resources. The three tenancies are codifiedby tokens, enforced by Cloud Gate, and used by the business services inthe middle tier. In one embodiment, an OAuth server generates thetokens. In various embodiments, the tokens may be used in conjunctionwith any security protocol other than OAuth.

Decoupling user, client, and resource tenancies provides substantialbusiness advantages for the users of the services provided by IDCS. Forexample, it allows a service provider that understands the needs of abusiness (e.g., a healthcare business) and their identity-managementproblems to buy services provided by IDCS, develop their own backendapplication that consumes the services of IDCS, and provide the backendapplications to the target businesses. Accordingly, the service providermay extend the services of IDCS to provide their desired capabilitiesand offer those to certain target businesses. The service provider doesnot have to build and run software to provide identity services but caninstead extend and customize the services of IDCS to suit the needs ofthe target businesses.

Some known systems only account for a single tenancy which is customertenancy. However, such systems are inadequate when dealing with accessby a combination of users such as customer users, customer's partners,customer's clients, clients themselves, or clients that customer hasdelegated access to. Defining and enforcing multiple tenancies in theembodiments facilitates the identity-management functionality over suchvariety of users.

In one embodiment, one entity of IDCS does not belong to multipletenants at the same time; it belongs to only one tenant, and a “tenancy”is where artifacts live. Generally, there are multiple components thatimplement certain functions, and these components can belong to tenantsor they can belong to infrastructure. When infrastructure needs to acton behalf of tenants, it interacts with an entity service on behalf ofthe tenant. In that case, infrastructure itself has its own tenancy andcustomer has its own tenancy. When a request is submitted, there can bemultiple tenancies involved in the request.

For example, a client that belongs to “tenant 1” may execute a requestto get a token for “tenant 2” specifying a user in “tenant 3.” Asanother example, a user living in “tenant 1” may need to perform anaction in an application owned by “tenant 2”. Thus, the user needs to goto the resource namespace of “tenant 2” and request a token forthemselves. Accordingly, delegation of authority is accomplished byidentifying “who” can do “what” to “whom.” As yet another example, afirst user working for a first organization (“tenant 1”) may allow asecond user working for a second organization (“tenant 2”) to haveaccess to a document hosted by a third organization (“tenant 3”).

In one example, a client in “tenant 1” may request an access token for auser in “tenant 2” to access an application in “tenant 3”. The clientmay do so by invoking an OAuth request for the token by going to“http://tenant3/oauth/token”. The client identifies itself as a clientthat lives in “tenant 1” by including a “client assertion” in therequest. The client assertion includes a client ID (e.g., “client 1”)and the client tenancy “tenant 1”. As “client 1” in “tenant 1”, theclient has the right to invoke a request for a token on “tenant 3”, andthe client wants the token for a user in “tenant 2”. Accordingly, a“user assertion” is also passed as part of the same HTTP request. Theaccess token that is generated will be issued in the context of thetarget tenancy which is the application tenancy (“tenant 3”) and willinclude the user tenancy (“tenant 2”).

In one embodiment, in the data tier, each tenant is implemented as aseparate stripe. From a data management perspective, artifacts live in atenant. From a service perspective, a service knows how to work withdifferent tenants, and the multiple tenancies are different dimensionsin the business function of a service. FIG. 8 illustrates an examplesystem 800 implementing multiple tenancies in an embodiment. System 800includes a client 802 that requests a service provided by a microservice804 that understands how to work with data in a database 806. Thedatabase includes multiple tenants 808 and each tenant includes theartifacts of the corresponding tenancy. In one embodiment, microservice804 is an OAuth microservice requested throughhttps://tenant3/oauth/token for getting a token. The function of theOAuth microservice is performed in microservice 804 using data fromdatabase 806 to verify that the request of client 802 is legitimate, andif it is legitimate, use the data from different tenancies 808 toconstruct the token. Accordingly, system 800 is multi-tenant in that itcan work in a cross-tenant environment by not only supporting servicescoming into each tenancy, but also supporting services that can act onbehalf of different tenants.

System 800 is advantageous since microservice 804 is physicallydecoupled from the data in database 806, and by replicating the dataacross locations that are closer to the client, microservice 804 can beprovided as a local service to the clients and system 800 can manage theavailability of the service and provide it globally.

In one embodiment, microservice 804 is stateless, meaning that themachine that runs microservice 804 does not maintain any markerspointing the service to any specific tenants. Instead, a tenancy may bemarked, for example, on the host portion of a URL of a request thatcomes in. That tenancy points to one of tenants 808 in database 806.When supporting a large number of tenants (e.g., millions of tenants),microservice 804 cannot have the same number of connections to database806, but instead uses a connection pool 810 which provides the actualphysical connections to database 806 in the context of a database user.

Generally, connections are built by supplying an underlying driver orprovider with a connection string, which is used to address a specificdatabase or server and to provide instance and user-authenticationcredentials (e.g., “Server=sql_box;Database=Common;UserID=uid;Pwd=password;”). Once a connection has been built, it can beopened and closed, and properties (e.g., the command time-out length, ortransaction, if one exists) can be set. The connection string includes aset of key-value pairs, dictated by the data access interface of thedata provider. A connection pool is a cache of database connectionsmaintained so that the connections can be reused when future requests toa database are required. In connection pooling, after a connection iscreated, it is placed in the pool and it is used again so that a newconnection does not have to be established. For example, when thereneeds to be ten connections between microservice 804 and database 808,there will be ten open connections in connection pool 810, all in thecontext of a database user (e.g., in association with a specificdatabase user, e.g., who is the owner of that connection, whosecredentials are being validated, is it a database user, is it a systemcredential, etc.).

The connections in connection pool 810 are created for a system userthat can access anything. Therefore, in order to correctly handleauditing and privileges by microservice 804 processing requests onbehalf of a tenant, the database operation is performed in the contextof a “proxy user” 812 associated with the schema owner assigned to thespecific tenant. This schema owner can access only the tenancy that theschema was created for, and the value of the tenancy is the value of theschema owner. When a request is made for data in database 806,microservice 804 uses the connections in connection pool 810 to providethat data. Accordingly, multi-tenancy is achieved by having stateless,elastic middle tier services process incoming requests in the context of(e.g., in association with) the tenant-specific data store bindingestablished on a per request basis on top of the data connection createdin the context of (e.g., in association with) the data store proxy userassociated with the resource tenancy, and the database can scaleindependently of the services.

The following provides an example functionality for implementing proxyuser 812:

dbOperation=<prepare DB command to execute>

dbConnection=getDBConnectionFromPool( )

dbConnection.setProxyUser (resourceTenant)

result=dbConnection.executeOperation (dbOperation)

In this functionality, microservice 804 sets the “Proxy User” setting onthe connection pulled from connection pool 810 to the “Tenant,” andperforms the database operation in the context of the tenant while usingthe database connection in connection pool 810.

When striping every table to configure different columns in a samedatabase for different tenants, one table may include all tenants' datamixed together. In contrast, one embodiment provides a tenant-drivendata tier. The embodiment does not stripe the same database fordifferent tenants, but instead provides a different physical databaseper tenant. For example, multi-tenancy may be implemented by using apluggable database (e.g., Oracle Database 12c from Oracle Corp.) whereeach tenant is allocated a separate partition. At the data tier, aresource manager processes the request and then asks for the data sourcefor the request (separate from metadata). The embodiment performsruntime switch to a respective data source/store per request. Byisolating each tenant's data from the other tenants, the embodimentprovides improved data security.

In one embodiment, various tokens codify different tenancies. A URLtoken may identify the tenancy of the application that requests aservice. An identity token may codify the identity of a user that is tobe authenticated. An access token may identify multiple tenancies. Forexample, an access token may codify the tenancy that is the target ofsuch access (e.g., an application tenancy) as well as the user tenancyof the user that is given access. A client assertion token may identifya client ID and the client tenancy. A user-assertion token may identifythe user and the user tenancy.

In one embodiment, an identity token includes at least a claimindicating the user tenant name (i.e., where the user lives).

In one embodiment, an access token includes at least a claim indicatingthe resource tenant name at the time the request for the access tokenwas made (e.g., the customer), a claim indicating the user tenant name,a claim indicating the name of the OAuth client making the request, anda claim indicating the client tenant name. In one embodiment, an accesstoken may be implemented according to the following JSON functionality:

{  ...  ″ tok_type ″ : ″AT″,  ″user_id″ : ″testuser″,  ″user_tenantname″: ″<value-of-identity-tenant>″  “tenant” : “<value-of-resource-tenant>” “client_id” : “testclient”,  “client_tenantname”:“<value-of-client-tenant>”  ... }

In one embodiment, a client assertion token includes at least a claimindicating the client tenant name, and a claim indicating the name ofthe OAuth client making the request.

The tokens and/or multiple tenancies described herein may be implementedin any multi-tenant cloud-based service other than IDCS. For example,the tokens and/or multiple tenancies described herein may be implementedin SaaS or Enterprise Resource Planning (“ERP”) services.

FIG. 9 is a block diagram of a network view 900 of IDCS in oneembodiment. FIG. 9 illustrates network interactions that are performedin one embodiment between application “zones” 904. Applications arebroken into zones based on the required level of protection and theimplementation of connections to various other systems (e.g., SSL zone,no SSL zone, etc.). Some application zones provide services that requireaccess from the inside of IDCS, while some application zones provideservices that require access from the outside of IDCS, and some are openaccess. Accordingly, a respective level of protection is enforced foreach zone.

In the embodiment of FIG. 9, service to service communication isperformed using HTTP requests. In one embodiment, IDCS uses the accesstokens described herein not only to provide services but also to secureaccess to and within IDCS itself. In one embodiment, IDCS microservicesare exposed through RESTful interfaces and secured by the tokensdescribed herein.

In the embodiment of FIG. 9, any one of a variety ofapplications/services 902 may make HTTP calls to IDCS APIs to use IDCSservices. In one embodiment, the HTTP requests of applications/services902 go through an Oracle Public Cloud Load Balancing External Virtual IPaddress (“VIP”) 906 (or other similar technologies), a public cloudweb-routing tier 908, and an IDCS Load Balancing Internal VIP appliance910 (or other similar technologies), to be received by IDCS web-routingtier 912. IDCS web-routing tier 912 receives the requests coming in fromthe outside or from the inside of IDCS and routes them across either anIDCS platform-services tier 914 or an IDCS infrastructure-services tier916. IDCS platform-services tier 914 includes IDCS microservices thatare invoked from the outside of IDCS, such as OpenID Connect, OAuth,SAML, SCIM, etc. IDCS infrastructure-services tier 916 includessupporting microservices that are invoked from the inside of IDCS tosupport the functionality of other IDCS microservices. Examples of IDCSinfrastructure microservices are UI, SSO, reports, cache, job scheduler,service manager, functionality for making keys, etc. An IDCS cache tier926 supports caching functionality for IDCS platform-services tier 914and IDCS infrastructure-services tier 916.

By enforcing security both for outside access to IDCS and within IDCS,customers of IDCS can be provided with outstanding security compliancefor the applications they run.

In the embodiment of FIG. 9, other than the data tier 918 whichcommunicates based on Structured Query Language (“SQL”) and the ID storetier 920 that communicates based on LDAP, OAuth protocol is used toprotect the communication among IDCS components (e.g., microservices)within IDCS, and the same tokens that are used for securing access fromthe outside of IDCS are also used for security within IDCS. That is,web-routing tier 912 uses the same tokens and protocols for processingthe requests it receives regardless of whether a request is receivedfrom the outside of IDCS or from the inside of IDCS. Accordingly, IDCSprovides a single consistent security model for protecting the entiresystem, thereby allowing for outstanding security compliance since thefewer security models implemented in a system, the more secure thesystem is.

In the IDCS cloud environment, applications communicate by makingnetwork calls. The network call may be based on an applicable networkprotocol such as HTTP, Transmission Control Protocol (“TCP”), UserDatagram Protocol (“UDP”), etc. For example, an application “X” maycommunicate with an application “Y” based on HTTP by exposingapplication “Y” as an HTTP Uniform Resource Locator (“URL”). In oneembodiment, “Y” is an IDCS microservice that exposes a number ofresources each corresponding to a capability. When “X” (e.g., anotherIDCS microservice) needs to call “Y”, it constructs a URL that includes“Y” and the resource/capability that needs to be invoked (e.g.,https:/host/Y/resource), and makes a corresponding REST call which goesthrough web-routing tier 912 and gets directed to “Y”.

In one embodiment, a caller outside the IDCS may not need to know where“Y” is, but web-routing tier 912 needs to know where application “Y” isrunning. In one embodiment, IDCS implements discovery functionality(implemented by an API of OAuth service) to determine where eachapplication is running so that there is no need for the availability ofstatic routing information.

In one embodiment, an enterprise manager (“EM”) 922 provides a “singlepane of glass” that extends on-premise and cloud-based management toIDCS. In one embodiment, a “Chef” server 924 which is a configurationmanagement tool from Chef Software, Inc., provides configurationmanagement functionality for various IDCS tiers. In one embodiment, aservice deployment infrastructure and/or a persistent stored module 928may send OAuth2 HTTP messages to IDCS web-routing tier 912 for tenantlifecycle management operations, public cloud lifecycle managementoperations, or other operations. In one embodiment, IDCSinfrastructure-services tier 916 may send ID/password HTTP messages to apublic cloud notification service 930 or a public cloud storage service932.

Cloud Access Control—SSO

One embodiment supports lightweight cloud standards for implementing acloud scale SSO service. Examples of lightweight cloud standards areHTTP, REST, and any standard that provides access through a browser(since a web browser is lightweight). On the contrary, SOAP is anexample of a heavy cloud standard which requires more management,configuration, and tooling to build a client with. The embodiment usesOpenID Connect semantics for applications to request user authenticationagainst IDCS. The embodiment uses lightweight HTTP cookie-based usersession tracking to track user's active sessions at IDCS withoutstatefull server-side session support. The embodiment uses JWT-basedidentity tokens for applications to use in mapping an authenticatedidentity back to their own local session. The embodiment supportsintegration with federated identity-management systems, and exposes SAMLIDP support for enterprise deployments to request user authenticationagainst IDCS.

FIG. 10 is a block diagram 1000 of a system architecture view of SSOfunctionality in IDCS in one embodiment. The embodiment enables clientapplications to leverage standards-based web protocols to initiateuser-authentication flows. Applications requiring SSO integration with acloud system may be located in enterprise data centers, in remotepartner data centers, or even operated by a customer on-premise. In oneembodiment, different IDCS platform services implement the business ofSSO, such as OpenID Connect for processing login/logout requests fromconnected native applications (i.e., applications utilizing OpenIDConnect to integrate with IDCS); SAML IDP service for processingbrowser-based login/logout requests from connected applications; SAML SPservice for orchestrating user authentication against an external SAMLIDP; and an internal IDCS SSO service for orchestrating end user loginceremony including local or federated login flows, and for managing IDCShost session cookie. Generally, HTTP works either with a form or withouta form. When it works with a form, the form is seen within a browser.When it works without a form, it functions as a client to servercommunication. Both OpenID Connect and SAML require the ability torender a form, which may be accomplished by presence of a browser orvirtually performed by an application that acts as if there is abrowser. In one embodiment, an application client implementing userauthentication/SSO through IDCS needs to be registered in IDCS as anOAuth2 client and needs to obtain client identifier and credentials(e.g., ID/password, ID/certificate, etc.).

The example embodiment of FIG. 10 includes threecomponents/microservices that collectively provide login capabilities,including two platform microservices: OAuth2 1004 and SAML2 1006, andone infrastructure microservice: SSO 1008. In the embodiment of FIG. 10,IDCS provides an “Identity Metasystem” in which SSO services 1008 areprovided over different types of applications, such as browser-based webor native applications 1010 requiring 3-legged OAuth flow and acting asan OpenID Connect relaying party (“RP,” an application that outsourcesits user-authentication function to an IDP), native applications 1011requiring 2-legged OAuth flow and acting as an OpenID Connect RP, andweb applications 1012 acting as a SAML SP.

Generally, an Identity Metasystem is an interoperable architecture fordigital identity, allowing for employing a collection of digitalidentities based on multiple underlying technologies, implementations,and providers. LDAP, SAML, and OAuth are examples of different securitystandards that provide identity capability and can be the basis forbuilding applications, and an Identity Metasystem may be configured toprovide a unified security system over such applications. The LDAPsecurity model specifies a specific mechanism for handling identity, andall passes through the system are to be strictly protected. SAML wasdeveloped to allow one set of applications securely exchange informationwith another set of applications that belong to a different organizationin a different security domain. Since there is no trust between the twoapplications, SAML was developed to allow for one application toauthenticate another application that does not belong to the sameorganization. OAuth provides OpenID Connect that is a lightweightprotocol for performing web-based authentication.

In the embodiment of FIG. 10, when an OpenID application 1010 connectsto an OpenID server in IDCS, its “channels” request SSO service.Similarly, when a SAML application 1012 connects to a SAML server inIDCS, its “channels” also request SSO service. In IDCS, a respectivemicroservice (e.g., an OpenID microservice 1004 and a SAML microservice1006) will handle each of the applications, and these microservicesrequest SSO capability from SSO microservice 1008. This architecture canbe expanded to support any number of other security protocols by addinga microservice for each protocol and then using SSO microservice 1008for SSO capability. SSO microservice 1008 issues the sessions (i.e., anSSO cookie 1014 is provided) and is the only system in the architecturethat has the authority to issue a session. An IDCS session is realizedthrough the use of SSO cookie 1014 by browser 1002. Browser 1002 alsouses a local session cookie 1016 to manage its local session.

In one embodiment, for example, within a browser, a user may use a firstapplication based on SAML and get logged in, and later use a secondapplication built with a different protocol such as OAuth. The user isprovided with SSO on the second application within the same browser.Accordingly, the browser is the state or user agent and maintains thecookies.

In one embodiment, SSO microservice 1008 provides login ceremony 1018,ID/password recovery 1020, first time login flow 1022, an authenticationmanager 1024, an HTTP cookie manager 1026, and an event manager 1028.Login ceremony 1018 implements SSO functionality based on customersettings and/or application context, and may be configured according toa local form (i.e., basic Auth), an external SAML IDP, an external OIDCIDP, etc. ID/password recovery 1020 is used to recover a user's IDand/or password. First time login flow 1022 is implemented when a userlogs in for the first time (i.e., an SSO session does not yet exist).Authentication manager 1024 issues authentication tokens upon successfulauthentication. HTTP cookie manager 1026 saves the authentication tokenin an SSO cookie. Event manager 1028 publishes events related to SSOfunctionality.

In one embodiment, interactions between OAuth microservice 1004 and SSOmicroservice 1008 are based on browser redirects so that SSOmicroservice 1008 challenges the user using an HTML form, validatescredentials, and issues a session cookie.

In one embodiment, for example, OAuth microservice 1004 may receive anauthorization request from browser 1002 to authenticate a user of anapplication according to 3-legged OAuth flow. OAuth microservice 1004then acts as an OIDC provider 1030, redirects browser 1002 to SSOmicroservice 1008, and passes along application context. Depending onwhether the user has a valid SSO session or not, SSO microservice 1008either validates the existing session or performs a login ceremony. Uponsuccessful authentication or validation, SSO microservice 1008 returnsauthentication context to OAuth microservice 1004. OAuth microservice1004 then redirects browser 1002 to a callback URL with an authorization(“AZ”) code. Browser 1002 sends the AZ code to OAuth microservice 1004to request the required tokens 1032. Browser 1002 also includes itsclient credentials (obtained when registering in IDCS as an OAuth2client) in the HTTP authorization header. OAuth microservice 1004 inreturn provides the required tokens 1032 to browser 1002. In oneembodiment, tokens 1032 provided to browser 1002 include JW identity andaccess tokens signed by the IDCS OAuth2 server. Further details of thisfunctionality are disclosed below with reference to FIG. 11.

In one embodiment, for example, OAuth microservice 1004 may receive anauthorization request from a native application 1011 to authenticate auser according to a 2-legged OAuth flow. In this case, an authenticationmanager 1034 in OAuth microservice 1004 performs the correspondingauthentication (e.g., based on ID/password received from a client 1011)and a token manager 1036 issues a corresponding access token uponsuccessful authentication.

In one embodiment, for example, SAML microservice 1006 may receive anSSO POST request from a browser to authenticate a user of a webapplication 1012 that acts as a SAML SP. SAML microservice 1006 thenacts as a SAML IDP 1038, redirects browser 1002 to SSO microservice1008, and passes along application context. Depending on whether theuser has a valid SSO session or not, SSO microservice 1008 eithervalidates the existing session or performs a login ceremony. Uponsuccessful authentication or validation, SSO microservice 1008 returnsauthentication context to SAML microservice 1006. SAML microservice thenredirects to the SP with required tokens.

In one embodiment, for example, SAML microservice 1006 may act as a SAMLSP 1040 and go to a remote SAML IDP 1042 (e.g., an active directoryfederation service (“ADFS”)). One embodiment implements the standardSAML/AD flows. In one embodiment, interactions between SAML microservice1006 and SSO microservice 1008 are based on browser redirects so thatSSO microservice 1008 challenges the user using an HTML form, validatescredentials, and issues a session cookie.

In one embodiment, the interactions between a component within IDCS(e.g., 1004, 1006, 1008) and a component outside IDCS (e.g., 1002, 1011,1042) are performed through firewalls 1044.

Login/Logout Flow

FIG. 11 is a message sequence flow 1100 of SSO functionality provided byIDCS in one embodiment. When a user uses a browser 1102 to access aclient 1106 (e.g., a browser-based application or a mobile/nativeapplication), Cloud Gate 1104 acts as an application enforcement pointand enforces a policy defined in a local policy text file. If Cloud Gate1104 detects that the user has no local application session, it requiresthe user to be authenticated. In order to do so, Cloud Gate 1104redirects browser 1102 to OAuth2 microservice 1110 to initiate OpenIDConnect login flow against the OAuth2 microservice 1110 (3-legged AZGrant flow with scopes=“openid profile”).

The request of browser 1102 traverses IDCS routing-tier web service 1108and Cloud Gate 1104 and reaches OAuth2 microservice 1110. OAuth2microservice 1110 constructs the application context (i.e., metadatathat describes the application, e.g., identity of the connectingapplication, client ID, configuration, what the application can do,etc.), and redirects browser 1102 to SSO microservice 1112 to log in.

If the user has a valid SSO session, SSO microservice 1112 validates theexisting session without starting a login ceremony. If the user does nothave a valid SSO session (i.e., no session cookie exists), the SSOmicroservice 1112 initiates the user login ceremony in accordance withcustomer's login preferences (e.g., displaying a branded login page). Inorder to do so, the SSO microservice 1112 redirects browser 1102 to alogin application service 1114 implemented in JavaScript. Loginapplication service 1114 provides a login page in browser 1102. Browser1102 sends a REST POST to the SSO microservice 1112 including logincredentials. The SSO microservice 1112 generates an access token andsends it to Cloud Gate 1104 in a REST POST. Cloud Gate 1104 sends theauthentication information to Admin SCIM microservice 1116 to validatethe user's password. Admin SCIM microservice 1116 determines successfulauthentication and sends a corresponding message to SSO microservice1112.

In one embodiment, during the login ceremony, the login page does notdisplay a consent page, as “login” operation requires no furtherconsent. Instead, a privacy policy is stated on the login page,informing the user about certain profile attributes being exposed toapplications. During the login ceremony, the SSO microservice 1112respects customer's IDP preferences, and if configured, redirects to theIDP for authentication against the configured IDP.

Upon successful authentication or validation, SSO microservice 1112redirects browser 1102 back to OAuth2 microservice 1110 with the newlycreated/updated SSO host HTTP cookie (e.g., the cookie that is createdin the context of the host indicated by “HOSTURL”) containing the user'sauthentication token. OAuth2 microservice 1110 returns AZ Code (e.g., anOAuth concept) back to browser 1102 and redirects to Cloud Gate 1104.Browser 1102 sends AZ Code to Cloud Gate 1104, and Cloud Gate 1104 sendsa REST POST to OAuth2 microservice 1110 to request the access token andthe identity token. Both tokens are scoped to OAuth microservice 1110(indicated by the audience token claim). Cloud Gate 1104 receives thetokens from OAuth2 microservice 1110.

Cloud Gate 1104 uses the identity token to map the user's authenticatedidentity to its internal account representation, and it may save thismapping in its own HTTP cookie. Cloud Gate 1104 then redirects browser1102 to client 1106. Browser 1102 then reaches client 1106 and receivesa corresponding response from client 1106. From this point on, browser1102 can access the application (i.e., client 1106) seamlessly for aslong as the application's local cookie is valid. Once the local cookiebecomes invalid, the authentication process is repeated.

Cloud Gate 1104 further uses the access token received in a request toobtain “userinfo” from OAuth2 microservice 1110 or the SCIMmicroservice. The access token is sufficient to access the “userinfo”resource for the attributes allowed by the “profile” scope. It is alsosufficient to access “/me” resources via the SCIM microservice. In oneembodiment, by default, the received access token is only good for userprofile attributes that are allowed under the “profile” scope. Access toother profile attributes is authorized based on additional (optional)scopes submitted in the AZ grant login request issued by Cloud Gate1104.

When the user accesses another OAuth2 integrated connecting application,the same process repeats.

In one embodiment, the SSO integration architecture uses a similarOpenID Connect user-authentication flow for browser-based user logouts.In one embodiment, a user with an existing application session accessesCloud Gate 1104 to initiate a logout. Alternatively, the user may haveinitiated the logout on the IDCS side. Cloud Gate 1104 terminates theapplication-specific user session, and initiates OAuth2 OpenID Provider(“OP”) logout request against OAuth2 microservice 1110. OAuth2microservice 1110 redirects to SSO microservice 1112 that kills theuser's host SSO cookie. SSO microservice 1112 initiates a set ofredirects (OAuth2 OP and SAML IDP) against known logout endpoints astracked in user's SSO cookie.

In one embodiment, if Cloud Gate 1104 uses SAML protocol to request userauthentication (e.g., login), a similar process starts between the SAMLmicroservice and SSO microservice 1112.

Cloud Cache

One embodiment provides a service/capability referred to as Cloud Cache.Cloud Cache is provided in IDCS to support communication withapplications that are LDAP-based (e.g., email servers, calendar servers,some business applications, etc.) since IDCS does not communicateaccording to LDAP while such applications are configured to communicateonly based on LDAP. Typically, cloud directories are exposed via RESTAPIs and do not communicate according to the LDAP protocol. Generally,managing LDAP connections across corporate firewalls requires specialconfigurations that are difficult to set up and manage.

To support LDAP-based applications, Cloud Cache translates LDAPcommunications to a protocol suitable for communication with a cloudsystem. Generally, an LDAP-based application uses a database via LDAP.An application may be alternatively configured to use a database via adifferent protocol such as SQL. However, LDAP provides a hierarchicalrepresentation of resources in tree structures, while SQL representsdata as tables and fields. Accordingly, LDAP may be more desirable forsearching functionality, while SQL may be more desirable fortransactional functionality.

In one embodiment, services provided by IDCS may be used in anLDAP-based application to, for example, authenticate a user of theapplications (i.e., an identity service) or enforce a security policyfor the application (i.e., a security service). In one embodiment, theinterface with IDCS is through a firewall and based on HTTP (e.g.,REST). Typically, corporate firewalls do not allow access to internalLDAP communication even if the communication implements Secure SocketsLayer (“SSL”), and do not allow a TCP port to be exposed through thefirewall. However, Cloud Cache translates between LDAP and HTTP to allowLDAP-based applications reach services provided by IDCS, and thefirewall will be open for HTTP.

Generally, an LDAP directory may be used in a line of business such asmarketing and development, and defines users, groups, works, etc. In oneexample, a marketing and development business may have differenttargeted customers, and for each customer, may have their ownapplications, users, groups, works, etc. Another example of a line ofbusiness that may run an LDAP cache directory is a wireless serviceprovider. In this case, each call made by a user of the wireless serviceprovider authenticates the user's device against the LDAP directory, andsome of the corresponding information in the LDAP directory may besynchronized with a billing system. In these examples, LDAP providesfunctionality to physically segregate content that is being searched atruntime.

In one example, a wireless service provider may handle its ownidentity-management services for their core business (e.g., regularcalls), while using services provided by IDCS in support of a short termmarketing campaign. In this case, Cloud Cache “flattens” LDAP when ithas a single set of users and a single set of groups that it runsagainst the cloud. In one embodiment, any number of Cloud Caches may beimplemented in IDCS.

Distributed Data Grid

In one embodiment, the cache cluster in IDCS is implemented based on adistributed data grid, as disclosed, for example, in U.S. Pat. Pub. No.2016/0092540, the disclosure of which is hereby incorporated byreference. A distributed data grid is a system in which a collection ofcomputer servers work together in one or more clusters to manageinformation and related operations, such as computations, within adistributed or clustered environment. A distributed data grid can beused to manage application objects and data that are shared across theservers. A distributed data grid provides low response time, highthroughput, predictable scalability, continuous availability, andinformation reliability. In particular examples, distributed data grids,such as, e.g., the Oracle Coherence data grid from Oracle Corp., storeinformation in-memory to achieve higher performance, and employredundancy in keeping copies of that information synchronized acrossmultiple servers, thus ensuring resiliency of the system and continuedavailability of the data in the event of failure of a server.

In one embodiment, IDCS implements a distributed data grid such asCoherence so that every microservice can request access to shared cacheobjects without getting blocked. Coherence is a proprietary Java-basedin-memory data grid, designed to have better reliability, scalability,and performance than traditional relational database management systems.Coherence provides a peer to peer (i.e., with no central manager),in-memory, distributed cache.

FIG. 12 illustrates an example of a distributed data grid 1200 whichstores data and provides data access to clients 1250 and implementsembodiments of the invention. A “data grid cluster”, or “distributeddata grid”, is a system comprising a plurality of computer servers(e.g., 1220 a, 1220 b, 1220 c, and 1220 d) which work together in one ormore clusters (e.g., 1200 a, 1200 b, 1200 c) to store and manageinformation and related operations, such as computations, within adistributed or clustered environment. While distributed data grid 1200is illustrated as comprising four servers 1220 a, 1220 b, 1220 c, 1220d, with five data nodes 1230 a, 1230 b, 1230 c, 1230 d, and 1230 e in acluster 1200 a, the distributed data grid 1200 may comprise any numberof clusters and any number of servers and/or nodes in each cluster. Inan embodiment, distributed data grid 1200 implements the presentinvention.

As illustrated in FIG. 12, a distributed data grid provides data storageand management capabilities by distributing data over a number ofservers (e.g., 1220 a, 1220 b, 1220 c, and 1220 d) working together.Each server of the data grid cluster may be a conventional computersystem such as, for example, a “commodity x86” server hardware platformwith one to two processor sockets and two to four CPU cores perprocessor socket. Each server (e.g., 1220 a, 1220 b, 1220 c, and 1220 d)is configured with one or more CPUs, Network Interface Cards (“NIC”),and memory including, for example, a minimum of 4 GB of RAM up to 64 GBof RAM or more. Server 1220 a is illustrated as having CPU 1222 a,Memory 1224 a, and NIC 1226 a (these elements are also present but notshown in the other Servers 1220 b, 1220 c, 1220 d). Optionally, eachserver may also be provided with flash memory (e.g., SSD 1228 a) toprovide spillover storage capacity. When provided, the SSD capacity ispreferably ten times the size of the RAM. The servers (e.g., 1220 a,1220 b, 1220 c, 1220 d) in a data grid cluster 1200 a are connectedusing high bandwidth NICs (e.g., PCI-X or PCIe) to a high-performancenetwork switch 1220 (for example, gigabit Ethernet or better).

A cluster 1200 a preferably contains a minimum of four physical serversto avoid the possibility of data loss during a failure, but a typicalinstallation has many more servers. Failover and failback are moreefficient the more servers that are present in each cluster and theimpact of a server failure on a cluster is lessened. To minimizecommunication time between servers, each data grid cluster is ideallyconfined to a single switch 1202 which provides single hop communicationbetween servers. A cluster may thus be limited by the number of ports onthe switch 1202. A typical cluster will therefore include between 4 and96 physical servers.

In most Wide Area Network (“WAN”) configurations of a distributed datagrid 1200, each data center in the WAN has independent, butinterconnected, data grid clusters (e.g., 1200 a, 1200 b, and 1200 c). AWAN may, for example, include many more clusters than shown in FIG. 12.Additionally, by using interconnected but independent clusters (e.g.,1200 a, 1200 b, 1200 c) and/or locating interconnected, but independent,clusters in data centers that are remote from one another, thedistributed data grid can secure data and service to clients 1250against simultaneous loss of all servers in one cluster caused by anatural disaster, fire, flooding, extended power loss, and the like.

One or more nodes (e.g., 1230 a, 1230 b, 1230 c, 1230 d and 1230 e)operate on each server (e.g., 1220 a, 1220 b, 1220 c, 1220 d) of acluster 1200 a. In a distributed data grid, the nodes may be, forexample, software applications, virtual machines, or the like, and theservers may comprise an operating system, hypervisor, or the like (notshown) on which the node operates. In an Oracle Coherence data grid,each node is a Java virtual machine (“JVM”). A number of JVMs/nodes maybe provided on each server depending on the CPU processing power andmemory available on the server. JVMs/nodes may be added, started,stopped, and deleted as required by the distributed data grid. JVMs thatrun Oracle Coherence automatically join and cluster when started.JVMs/nodes that join a cluster are called cluster members or clusternodes.

Each client or server includes a bus or other communication mechanismfor communicating information, and a processor coupled to bus forprocessing information. The processor may be any type of general orspecific purpose processor. Each client or server may further include amemory for storing information and instructions to be executed byprocessor. The memory can be comprised of any combination of randomaccess memory (“RAM”), read only memory (“ROM”), static storage such asa magnetic or optical disk, or any other type of computer readablemedia. Each client or server may further include a communication device,such as a network interface card, to provide access to a network.Therefore, a user may interface with each client or server directly, orremotely through a network, or any other method.

Computer readable media may be any available media that can be accessedby processor and includes both volatile and non-volatile media,removable and non-removable media, and communication media.Communication media may include computer readable instructions, datastructures, program modules, or other data in a modulated data signalsuch as a carrier wave or other transport mechanism, and includes anyinformation delivery media.

The processor may further be coupled via bus to a display, such as aLiquid Crystal Display (“LCD”). A keyboard and a cursor control device,such as a computer mouse, may be further coupled to bus to enable a userto interface with each client or server.

In one embodiment, the memory stores software modules that providefunctionality when executed by the processor. The modules include anoperating system that provides operating system functionality eachclient or server. The modules may further include a cloudidentity-management module for providing cloud identity-managementfunctionality, and all other functionality disclosed herein.

The clients may access a web service such as a cloud service. The webservice may be implemented on a WebLogic Server from Oracle Corp. in oneembodiment. In other embodiments, other implementations of a web servicecan be used. The web service accesses a database which stores clouddata.

As disclosed, embodiments implement a microservices-based architectureto provide cloud-based multi-tenant IAM services. In one embodiment,each requested identity-management service is broken into real-timetasks that are handled by a microservice in the middle tier, andnear-real-time tasks that are offloaded to a message queue. Accordingly,embodiments provide a cloud-scale IAM platform.

Customer-Self-Service Troubleshooting

One embodiment provides customer-self-service diagnostics functionalityto enable a customer (e.g., a tenant administrator) to find out theproblems with a particular type of operation and then try to fix theproblem without intervention from other support personnel (e.g., IDCSsupport, enterprise service provider support, etc.). The problem may be,for example, a configuration issue (e.g., misconfiguration of settings),an issue due to bad data-values, an issue that resulted from a useraction, any issue that can be understood/resolved by the user, etc. Ifthe customer cannot find and fix the problem without help, thediagnostics functionality provided by the embodiments may be used togenerate functional traces that the support personnel can use to findand fix the problem. In one embodiment, if the customer cannot find andfix the problem, the service provider infrastructure may automaticallyidentify and fix the problem. If the problem is not automatically fixed,the customer may directly contact the service provider's supportpersonnel and provide the diagnostics reports and request for help withresolving the problem.

Generally, known cloud services do not provide their customers/tenantswith self-service diagnostics functionality and do not allow a tenant tolook into such information. Instead, customers/tenants of known cloudservices need to rely on the administrator of the cloud for diagnosticsand for resolving problems. Some known systems may allow thetenants/customer to run an external utility to collect some diagnosticsinformation, but do not provide any built-in diagnostics functionalityto the tenants.

In contrast, embodiments provide the tenants of a cloud service with avirtual environment where the tenant has access to diagnosticsfunctionality similar to the diagnostics functionality provided foron-premise services. In one embodiment, although the service deploymentis in the cloud, the service appears to the tenant as beinginstalled/deployed on-premise and the internal information of theservice are available to the tenant. In one embodiment, the informationprovided to the tenant includes tenant-specific data but may not includeinternal, system-level information of the cloud in general. In oneembodiment, each IDCS component has built-in functionality to allow forenabling tenant self-service diagnostics functionality.

In one embodiment, tenant self-service diagnostics services run as partof IDCS services in the middle tier and can be consumed by internalmicroservices, and the corresponding storage is performed in thebackend. Accordingly, the collection and recording of diagnosticsinformation is performed within IDCS. A tenant may control thecollection of information and access the recorded information throughUIs provided by IDCS. For example, diagnostics may be enabled/disabledthrough an IDCS admin console UI.

In one embodiment, such diagnostics are in addition to operationalmonitoring, system troubleshooting, or system errors. In one embodiment,operational monitoring and alerting is performed on the entire IDCS byleveraging health metrics and logging. Operational monitoring aims atproblems with the runtime (e.g., slowdowns, connection issues, resourceproblems, networking, VM failures, operation-failures, etc.).

In one embodiment, diagnostics functionality is implemented by adiagnostics client and a diagnostics server. The diagnostics client isavailable and accessible to each IDCS microservice. The diagnosticsserver is running as part of the IDCS admin microservice. IDCSmicroservices invoke the same IDCS diagnostics client. Once invoked, thediagnostics client collects diagnostics information and pushes it to thediagnostics server running on the IDCS admin server. The diagnosticsserver saves the received diagnostics information in a storage. When auser wants to access that information, the user may use a correspondingUI, and the UI makes a call to the diagnostics server. The diagnosticsserver running on the IDCS admin server performs a search on the storeddiagnostics information and provides the required information to the UIclient. The diagnostics server may perform, for example, a full textsearch, a keyword search, etc.

In one embodiment, the communication between the diagnostics client andthe diagnostics server is performed over REST using an authenticationtoken with administrative level privileges.

In one embodiment, IDCS enables and supports diagnostics functionalityby using execution-contexts. An execution-context uniquely identifies arequest so that the request can be tracked as it flows through a system.Each request or task may form the root of a tree of sub-tasks that needto be completed for the request. An execution-context includes anexecution-context ID (“ECID”) and a relationship ID (“RID”). ECID is aunique identifier that correlates events/requests related to the sametransaction across various components. An RID is an ordered set ofnumbers that describes the location of each task in the tree ofsub-tasks. One embodiment passes an “ECID-Context” throughout IDCSservices and IDCS infrastructure components, and as it is getting passedthrough the IDCS, “ECID Context.Next( )” is called to perform the properupdating of the RID in the “ECID-Context.”

For example, one embodiment provides guidelines for instrumentation ofdiagnostics trace-logging for development teams to consume. In thisembodiment, a traffic director generates a unique “ECID-Context” valuefor each external request. Then, each component of IDCS sets an RIDvalue for each operation to reflect the position of that operationwithin the hierarchy (or tree) of sub-operations that are required toimplement a particular external request (e.g., as identified by ECID).Further, each component calls “ECID-Context.Next( )” to generate thenext RID value.

One embodiment requires each IDCS microservice and component to performtrace-logging for the purpose of diagnostics, especially where itsprocessing depends on customer-specified settings or on data-values fromthe customer's identity domain.

One embodiment allows each customer to enable diagnostics on particulartypes of operations and/or for particular sets of users. One embodimentallows a customer to enable diagnostics by setting a singlediagnostics-level that applies to all operations and all users. Oneembodiment may allow each customer to narrow the scope of diagnosticslogging.

One embodiment provides trace-logging functionality that each IDCScomponent/microservice performs based on an examination of problems thatcustomers cannot find and fix on their own and therefore escalate to aCustomer Service Representative (“CSR”).

In one embodiment, every diagnostics entry, regardless of its level,includes a timestamp, an “ECID-Context” (i.e., ECID and RID), and an“Actor Name” (if any).

In one embodiment, IDCS microservices/components perform trace-loggingat different levels, each intended for a different audience. The levelsinclude an activity-view-level, a data-view-level, and aservice-view-level. The activity-view-level is intended for thecustomer's administrator that views the functional tracing (e.g., whatactivities are going on). The data-view-level and the service-view-levelprovide more detailed analysis of the activity-view-level. Thedata-view-level is intended for a CSR (e.g., DevOps or supportpersonnel) that views protocol-level tracing (e.g., activity informationas well as information on tenant-specific data that is flowing amongvarious services). The service-view-level is intended for a CSR (e.g.,DevOps or support personnel) that views more detailed functional tracing(e.g., activity information, information on tenant-specific data that isflowing among various services, and low-level information on internalfunctionality).

For example, one embodiment provides an activity-view-level ofdiagnostics intended for the customer's administrator and describing theprocessing at a business level. In this embodiment, each IDCS componenttraces at the activity-view-level for the following information:

-   -   trace business-level flows, explaining, in terms that the        administrator understands, what each operation is doing,    -   explain significant “IF” conditions in the processing:        -   show the values that are used in those “IF” conditions,        -   explain the sources of those values (e.g., from            customer-specified settings or from attributes of resources            in the customer's identity domain),    -   highlight customer settings that are applied, and show the        values that are used,    -   discuss any search filters that are applied, and record the        results of the evaluation:        -   if practical (e.g., for a small number of matches), record            the IDs or names of individual resources that match the            filter,        -   otherwise (e.g., for a large number of matches), record the            number of resources that match the filter.

One embodiment provides data-view-level diagnostics intended for thetenant administrator and/or DevOps to debug any issues related toconfiguration. In this level, the tenant administrator and/or DevOps canverify the configuration they have provided as that configuration datais also logged. This level is intended for tracing protocols (e.g.,SCIM, LDAP, SAML, OIDC, OAuth, etc.). Each IDCS component traces atdata-view-level for protocol-level details and related configurationdata.

One embodiment provides service-view-level diagnostics intended forDevOps. The diagnostics at this level may be very detailed and verytechnical. Each IDCS component traces at service-view-level for the logsrelated to the following information:

-   -   logs of operations within each IDCS service or of communication        between IDCS services (e.g., SSO calling ADMIN Service),    -   entry-information, including parameter values and values from        session context,    -   exit-information, including return values,    -   exceptional-exit-information, including error code and exception        information,    -   calls/requests to other components, services or data managers,        including parameter values,    -   conditional branches and loop iteration, including:        -   loop-initialization and loop-entry,        -   index for each value being processed,        -   condition evaluation and loop-exit,    -   calculations and/or computed values that affect subsequent        processing.

In one embodiment, the low-level information provided in theservice-view-level may not be useful or understandable for the tenant,but may be useful to the service-provider support-personnel if thetenant provides the diagnostics report to the support personnel.

One embodiment allows for enabling customer-self-service diagnosticsfunctionality. A customer's administrator may enablecustomer-self-service diagnostics functionality either in the adminconsole UI or by editing a “/Settings/GlobalSettings” resource directly.In one embodiment, enabling or disabling diagnostics functionality inthe admin console UI updates the same “/Settings/GlobalSettings”resource. However, some embodiments expose in the underlying resourcemore advanced options than the admin console UI exposes.

In one embodiment, a customer's administrator may enablecustomer-self-service diagnostics functionality by setting acustomer-self-service diagnostics level that applies to all users andall operations within that customer's tenancy. In one embodiment,diagnostics functionality may allow a customer's administrator to enablediagnostics for a particular user ID that may belong to an administratoror an end user.

Customer-Self-Service Diagnostics Lifecycle (User Stories)

In one embodiment, customers may use customer-self-service diagnosticsfunctionality in one or two stages. In the first stage, a customer'sadministrator tries first to reproduce a reported problem. If theoperation works for the administrator but does not work for an end user,the administrator may then ask the end user to reproduce the reportedproblem. The administrator enables diagnostics functionality in theactivity-view-level during the reproduction, reviews the diagnosticsinformation, and then tries to fix the problem. In the second stage, ifthe administrator cannot find or fix the problem, then the administratorenables diagnostics functionality in the data-view-level or in theservice-view-level during the reproduction, and then filters the debuginformation to produce a log that the administrator can send to DevOpsto ask for help.

In one embodiment, the customer's administrator may try to reproduce aproblem. In one embodiment, a customer's administrator may notice whatappear to be problems with IDCS, or an end user may report the problemsto the customer's administrator.

In one embodiment, when IDCS displays an error or does not behave as acustomer's administrator expects, the customer's administrator canenable diagnostics functionality to find and fix the problem with aparticular type of operation. In one embodiment, in the admin consoleUI, the customer's administrator may enable diagnostics functionalityand choose the level as activity, data, or service view. The customer'sadministrator may also edit directly the underlying “/admin/v1/Settings”resource.

In one embodiment, once the customer's administrator has enableddiagnostics functionality, each IDCS component, as it operates, sendsdiagnostic records to the “/admin/v1/DiagnosticRecords” endpoint. Thecustomer's administrator then performs the problematic operation, eitherusing the UI, or by invoking RESTful web services of IDCS. Thecustomer's administrator then disables diagnostics functionality, eitherin the admin console UI or in the underlying “/admin/v1/Settings”resource. Diagnostics functionality may also get automatically disabledafter a period of time (e.g., 15 minutes). The customer's administratormay then go to the “Diagnostics” tab in the admin console UI to view thediagnostic items beneath “/Diagnostics.” In one embodiment, if thecustomer's administrator wants to do this programmatically, or wants tobuild their own UI, they may use HTTP to interact with the resourcesbelow the IDCS SCIM endpoint/applications.

In one embodiment, in the diagnostics view, a user sees a table ofdiagnostic items. Each item has an ECID, an actor, and a timestamp. Theitems may be sorted by default on ascending ECID, actor, and/ortimestamp. The order of items (e.g., based on the RID within ECID)reflects the hierarchy of operations required to implement each externalrequest. This lets the user “drill down” into the processing thatoccurred. Each item also includes diagnostic messages emitted by aparticular IDCS component.

In one embodiment, each diagnostic message explains to the user, inbusiness terms as much as possible, what that operation is doing. Wherethere are significant “IF” conditions in the processing, the diagnosticmessages show the values that are used in those “IF” conditions andexplain the sources of those values (e.g., from specific attributes insettings or from specific attributes of specific resources in theidentity domain). When the operation applies the values of the settingsthat the user controls, the diagnostic messages show which settings areapplied and which values are used. When the operation applies a filter,the diagnostic messages show the definition of the filter and record theresults of the evaluation. If the filter is applied to only a fewresources, the diagnostic messages show the IDs or names of individualresources that match the filter. If the filter is applied to a largenumber of resources, the diagnostic messages record the number ofresources that match the filter.

One embodiment provides diagnostic reports that include a table whereeach row corresponds to a diagnostics message. In one embodiment, thetable includes a “type/level” column, a ““service/component name”column, an “ecid/correlationid” column, an “actor id/name” column, and a“message” column. The “type/level” column indicates the view level usedfor the current message (e.g., activity, data, or service view) and isprovided by the component that writes the message. The“service/component name” column identifies the endpoint or fixedcomponent name, and may be related with the background operations/logs.The “ecid/correlationid” column provides the ECID of the call. In oneembodiment, every call has a context and if this information is notavailable then diagnostics should not have been invoked.

In one embodiment, the “actor id/name” column provides an end userunderstandable actor name rather than the actor ID (i.e., who iscurrently executing the flow). For external requests, this informationmay be obtained from the current subject user principal. Forinter-service routed requests, this information may be obtained from theclient principal. In one embodiment, this information may be partlydeduced in diagnostic code by reading current user principal's login ID,or client's login ID from “Subject”. If user/client principals are notset in “Subject,” the “actorID” value submitted by the caller may beused. If “actorID” is passed as blank/null, one embodiment indicates“Unauthenticated” as a fallback.

The “message” column provides the message. In the activity view, themessage denotes the action being performed by the user. In the dataview, it may provide additional information about the protocol and thedata being exchanged. In the service view, the message may furtherinclude information about the method being executed, its arguments, exitvalues, iteration status, search filters, etc.

Table 1 provides example diagnostic data for a particular operation inone embodiment. The operation, in this example, is an end user's displayof “MyApps” dashboard of IDCS. The scenario is that a particular enduser (e.g., “User 1”) does not see in their “MyApps” dashboard an iconthat they expected to see. The operation only has one sub-operation. Thetable includes an ECID column, an RID column (with RID values of 0 or0:1), a timestamp column, a user ID column, a service name column, amethod column (with methods “get” or “postGet”), a message column, and alevel column. In the UI, the user expects that the right hand columnswould be relegated to a “Details” page. The message column may have avery large value, so one embodiment may show only the first part of the“message” (e.g., a thumbnail) on the main page. If a particular row isselected or a “Details” link is clicked, the user sees the full messageand any columns to the right of the “message” column. The default sortorder shown below is ECID, timestamp ascending. The embodiment allowsfor following the story in chronological order within a particularexternal request and deciding whether to dive down into eachsub-operation. If an expandable row table is used, then the user is ableto expand/collapse individual values of ECID and individual values ofRID within ECID.

TABLE 1 Example diagnostic data in one embodiment ECID RID TimestampUserID Service Name Method Message Level B5C094FABE4AE8 0 2015-10-13T21:User 1 /MyApps get Entry, args=[ { “Id” : 1 32:44.880Z “C123456789AB” }]B5C094FABE4AE8 0 2015-10-13T21: User 1 /Admin get Entry, args=[ 132:44.881Z “C123456789AB” ] B5C094FABE4AE8 0 2015-10-13T21: User 1/Admin get Fetching appRoles for 1 32:44.882Z User “User 1”.B5C094FABE4AE8 0:1 2015-10-13T21: User 1 /Admin/Users get Entry, args=[1 32:44.883Z “C123456789AB”, “attributes=appRoles” ] B5C094FABE4AE8 0:12015-10-13T21: User 1 /Admin/Users get Entry, args=[ 1 32:44.884Z“C123456789AB” , “attributes=appRoles” ] B5C094FABE4AE8 0:12015-10-13T21: User 1 /Admin/Users get Exit, returning “{ 1 32:44.885Z“Id : “C123456789AB” , “appRoles” : [ { “value” : “C5C094FABE4AF9”> ,”$ref” : “admin/v1/AppRoles/C5C 094FABE4AF9” , ”display” : “myMCS_Users”, “type” : “direct” , “appID” : “A0123456789A” , “appName” : “myMCS” ,“adminRole” : false }. { “value” : “D5C094FABE4D01” , ”$ref” :“/admin/v1/AppRoles/D5C 094FABE4D01” , ”display” : “myDCS_ROUsers” ,“type” : “direct” , “appID” : “D0123456789D” , “appName” : “myDCS” ,“adminRole” : false }. { “value” : “EF31094FABE4D02” , “$ref” :“/admin/v1/AppRoles/EF3 1094FABE4D02” , “display” : “myDCS_RWUsers” ,“type” : “direct” , “appID” : “D0123456789D” , “appName” : “myDCS” ,“adminRole” : false } ] }” B5C094FABE4AE8 0:1 2015-10-13T21: User 1/Admin/Users postGet Entry, 32:44.886Z args=[“C123456789AB” ,“attributes=appRoles” ] B5C094FABE4AE8 0:1 2015-10-13T21: User 1/Admin/Users postGet Adding public AppRoles: 32:44.887Z “myOSN_User”.B5C094FABE4AE8 0:1 2015-10-13T21: User 1 /Admin/Users postGet Exit,returning “{ 32:44.888Z “id” : “C123456789AB” , appRoles: [ { “value” :“C5C094FABE4AF9” , “$ref” : “/admin/v1/AppRoles/C5C 094FABE4AF9” ,“display” : “myMCS_Users” , “type” : direct” , “appID” : “A0123456789A”, “appName” : “myMCS” , “adminRole” : false }. { “value” :“D5C094FABE4D01” , “$ref” : “admin/v1/AppRoles/D5C 094FABE4D01” ,“display” : “myDCS_ROUsers” , “type” : “direct” , “appID” :“D0123456789D” , “appName” : “myDCS” , “adminRole” : false }, { “value”: “EF31094FABE4D02” , “$ref” : “/admin/v1/AppRoles/EF3 1094FABE4D02” ,“display” : “myDCS_RWUsers” , “type” : “direct” , “appID” :“D0123456789D” , “appName” : “myDCS” , “adminRole” : false }. { “value”: “05123456789A” , “$ref” : “/admin/v1/AppRoles/0512 3456789A” ,“display” : “myOSN_User” , “type” : “indirect” , “appID” :“0123456789A0” , “appName” : “myOSN” , “adminRole” : false } ] }”B5C094FABE4AE8 0 2015-10-13T21: User 1 /Admin get Examining AppRoles to32:44.889Z accumulate distinct Apps.... B5C094FABE4AE8 0 2015-10-13T21:User 1 /Admin get Examining AppRole 32:44.890Z “myMCS_Users”: Adding App“myMCS”. B5C094FABE4AE8 0 2015-10-13T21: User 1 /Admin get ExaminingAppRole 32:44.891Z “myDCS_ROUsers”: adding App “myDCS”. B5C094FABE4AE8 02015-10-13T21: User 1 /Admin get Examining AppRole 32:44.892Z“myDCS_RWUsers”: duplicate App “myDCS”. B5C094FABE4AE8 0 2015-10-13T21:User 1 /Admin get Examining AppRole 32:44.893Z “myOSN_User”: Adding App“myOSN”. B5C094FABE4AE8 0 2015-10-13T21: User 1 /Admin/MyApps getAccumulated distinct 32:44.894Z Apps: “myMCS”, “myDCS”, “myOSN”.B5C094FABE4AE8 0:1 2015-10-13T21: User 1 MyAppsManager get Exit,returning “{ 32:44.895Z Impl “id” : “C123456789AB” , “apps” : [ {“value” : “A0123456789A” , “$ref” : “/admin/v1/Apps/A012345 6789A” ,“display” : “myMCS” }, { “value” : “D0123456789D” , “$ref” :“/admin/v1/Apps/D012345 6789A0” , “display” : “myOSN” } ] }”B5C094FABE4AE8 0 2015-10-13T21: User 1 /MyApps get Exit, returning “{32:44.896Z “id” : “C123456789AB” , “apps” : [ { “value” : “A0123456789A”, “$ref” : “/admin/v1/Apps/A012345 6789A” , “display” : “myMCS” }, {“value” : “D0123456789D” , “$ref” : “/admin/v1/Apps/D012345 6789D” ,“display” : “myDCS” }, { “value” : “0123456789A0” , “ref” :“/admin/v1/Apps/0123456 789A0” , “display” : “myOSN” } ] }”

In one embodiment, in the diagnostics view, the user has the ability tofilter on particular values of ECID or user ID. This helps the user tofocus on the diagnostic items related to the problematic operation.

In one embodiment, in the diagnostics view, the user has the ability toselect and delete particular diagnostic items, particularly if the listincludes diagnostics items that the user no longer needs.

In one embodiment, in the diagnostics view, the user has the ability toselect a set of diagnostics items and export them, thereby producing alog file that the user can share with others. In one embodiment, IDCSwrites the log file to the storage service instance for that customer.

In one embodiment, as a customer's administrator, if the user cannotfind or fix the problem on their own, they can enable debugfunctionality and produce a log file that they can send to a CSR. Forexample, the user may enable diagnostics functionality atdata-view-level (which may be indicated by “2” at “Level” column ofTable 1) or service-view-level (which may be indicated by “3” at “Level”column of Table 1). The diagnostics messages in items at data-view-levelmay include information that is more technical than user friendly, andthe user may not understand that content. After exporting the debuginformation, the user may send that file to CSR (e.g., DevOps) to askfor help.

In one embodiment, various levels of trace are provided, including“INFO” intended for the customer's administrator so that theadministrator can find and fix a problem without help from DevOps, and“DEBUG FINE/FINEST” intended for DevOps/CSR so that enterprise employeescan help in case the customer cannot find and fix the problem.

One embodiment provides support for enabling diagnostics for all users.One embodiment provides support for enabling diagnostics for a specificIDCS service, for a specific IDCS resource type, or for a specific IDCSresource. One embodiment provides support for enabling diagnostics forall users and operations within a customer's tenancy.

One embodiment reproduces a specific problem that a user had reported,and uses a specific user ID to reproduce the problem (e.g., capturingdiagnostics from that specific operation).

One embodiment supports “operations” diagnostics functionality (i.e.,diagnostics functionality for particular types of operations) for allIDCS services (e.g., enabling diagnostics sets an attribute in“GlobalSetting: trace=true”).

One embodiment supports operations diagnostics functionality for aspecific IDCS service (e.g., enabling diagnostics sets an attribute in“<Service>Setting: traceService=<nameOfService>”). The service may be,for example, Admin, SSO, SAML Federation, OAuth, user notification,background jobs (e.g., application, provisioning, change log, etc.),etc.

One embodiment supports operations diagnostics functionality forspecific resource types within a service (e.g., enabling diagnosticssets an attribute in “<Service>Setting:traceResourceTypes=<listOfResourceTypes>”).

One embodiment supports operations diagnostics functionality forspecific resources (e.g., enabling diagnostics sets an attribute in“<Service>Setting: traceResources=<listOfResourcelDs>”).

One embodiment supports “user” diagnostics functionality (i.e.,diagnostics functionality for operations requested by a user) for everyuser (e.g., enabling diagnostics sets an attribute in“GlobalSetting/<Service>Setting: traceSubject=ANY”).

One embodiment supports user diagnostics functionality for a specificuser (e.g., enabling diagnostics sets an attribute in“GlobalSetting/<Service>Setting: traceSubject=<IdOfUser>”).

One embodiment supports user diagnostics functionality only for theadministrator (e.g., enabling diagnostics injects a value into thesession context for the admin user). One embodiment supports userdiagnostics functionality for any single user (e.g., an admin, an enduser, etc.).

In one embodiment, the level of diagnostics (i.e., level 1 or level 2)that the administrator has enabled applies to every operation performedwithin that customer's tenancy. One embodiment may provide the abilityfor an administrator to set a specific level for each operational scope.One embodiment may apply the configured level of diagnostics to everyoperation within that customer's tenancy.

One embodiment defines a sentinel value of user ID (e.g.,“<UNAUTHENTICATED>”) that enables diagnostics for any unauthenticateduser. One embodiment may capture diagnostics for every user and everyoperation within that customer's tenancy, which includes operations byunauthenticated users.

In one embodiment, CSR (e.g., an Oracle CSR) is able to log intocustomer's tenancy after being authorized by the customer, and canenable diagnostics for a particular customer using the IDCS systemconsole.

One embodiment deletes the previous diagnostics session automaticallywhenever an administrator enables diagnostics. One embodiment deletesany previous diagnostics sessions for that administrator whenever anadministrator enables diagnostics. One embodiment allows theadministrator to specify the range of timestamp values to use ingenerating the report.

FIGS. 13-15 provide an example sequence of UIs for enabling andaccessing diagnostics functionality in IDCS according to an embodiment.In a diagnostics settings UI 1300 as illustrated in FIG. 13, a user mayenable diagnostics functionality by setting a diagnostics level 1302(e.g., setting the level as “Info”, “Fine”, or “Finest”). In thisembodiment, diagnostics functionality may be disabled by setting thediagnostics level as “None”. In one embodiment, once enabled,diagnostics functionality remains enabled for a period of time (e.g., 15minutes) unless a user disables it earlier. The user may then continueusing IDCS by invoking various flows, and each flow may internallyperform diagnostics recording if enabled to do so.

Once diagnostics functionality has been enabled via diagnostics settingsUI 1300, the user may go to a reporting UI 1400 as illustrated in FIG.14 to access diagnostics reports, and click on a “Diagnostics link” 1402to view diagnostics data. In one embodiment, diagnostics settings UI1300 also provides information related to users and application. Forexample, diagnostics settings UI 1300 may provide an applications window1404 that allows the user to view user logins and application rolesassignments for their applications.

Upon clicking on “Diagnostics link” 1402, the user can view adiagnostics recording 1502 for a particular level 1506 (e.g., all,information (activity-view-level), fine (data-view-level), finest(service-view-level), etc.) and time period 1504 (e.g., 15 minutes, 30minutes, 60 minutes, a custom time period, etc.) as illustrated in adiagnostics report UI 1500 in FIG. 15. The user may also use a downloadbutton 1508 to download the diagnostics recording 1502 (e.g., as aPortable Document Format (“PDF”) file).

One embodiment allows for uptake of customer-self-service diagnostics.

In one embodiment, the following example functionality allows fordiagnostics recording by injecting a diagnostics manager in aHundred-Kilobyte Kernel (“HK2”) loaded code:

@Inject oracle.idaas.common.diagnostics.DiagnosticManagerdiagnosticManager

One embodiment supports activity-view, data-view, and service-viewlevels of diagnostics recording, but other levels of granularity mayalso be provided (e.g., “ComponentName”). The embodiment implements thefollowing functionality to support different activity views:

-   -   diagnosticManager.trace(oracle.idaas.common.diagnostics.Level        level/type, String serviceName, String ecid, String actorld,        String message)        In one embodiment, diagnostics are recorded only if enabled on a        “/Settings” endpoint. In one embodiment, diagnostics may be        enabled for a fixed duration of time only (e.g., 15 minutes). In        one embodiment, “serviceName” is a string and a user may enter        “/servicName” (e.g., “/admin”). If the user wants more details,        then they can enter “/serviceName/endpointName” (e.g.,        “/admin/Groups”) or even further levels down, separated by        “slash” or “dot” character, as long as the whole string is        meaningful to the tenant administrator.

In one embodiment, the following example functionality may be used todetermine if diagnostics functionality is enabled before doing any tracecalls:

diagnosticManager.isLoggable(oracle.idaas.common.diagnostics.Levellevel)

One embodiments implements a “curl” command to verify the resultsaccording to the following example functionality:

-   -   curl hostname:8990/admin/v1/DiagnosticRecords -H        “X-USER-IDENTITY-DOMAIN-NAME: TENANT1”-H “content-type:        application/json”        The following is an example output of the above functionality:

{ “schemas”: [ “urn:scim:api:messages:2.0:ListResponse” ],“totalResults”: 1, “Resources”: [ { “message”: “invoked fromvalidateSearch”, “userid”: “Dummy User”, “ecid”: “gSw1_1O0000000000”,“timestamp”: “2015-12-10T04:26:06Z”, “serviceName”: “Admin”, “level”:“1”, “id”: “cfb19cc50f914191891a6288d30926cf”, “meta”: { “resourceType”:“DiagnosticRecord”, “created”: “2015-12-10T04:26:09Z”, “lastModified”:“2015-12-10T04:26:09Z”, “location”:“http://slc09tdu.us.oracle.com:8990/admin/v1/DiagnosticRecords/cfb19cc50f914191891a6288d30926cf” }, “schemas”: [“urn:ietf:params:scim:schemas:oracle:idcs:DiagnosticRecord” ] },“schemas”: [ “urn:ietf:params:scim:schemas:oracle:idcs:DiagnosticRecord”] } ], “startIndex”: 1, “itemsPerPage”: 50 }

One embodiment implements a “curl” command to verify settings accordingto the following example functionality:

-   -   curl -X GET hostname:8990/admin/v1/Settings/Settings -H        “X-USER-IDENTITY-DOMAIN-NAME:TENANT1”-H “content-type:        application/json”        The following is an example output of the above functionality:

{ “id”: “Settings”, “schemas”: [“urn:ietf:params:scim:schemas:oracle:idcs:Settings” ], “customBranding”:true, “diagnosticLevel”: 0, “meta”: { “resourceType”: “Settings” } }

In one embodiment, a returned “diagnosticLevel” value of “1” indicatesactivity view, “2” indicates data view, “3” indicates service view, and“0” or any other value indicates “OFF.”

In one embodiment, a “curl” command may be used to enableactivity-view-level diagnostics from a “Settings” endpoint according tothe following example functionality:

-   -   curl -X PUT hostname:8990/admin/v1/Settings/Settings -H        “X-USER-IDENTITY-DOMAIN-NAME:TENANT1” -H “content-type:        application/json”—data “{\“id\”:\“Settings\”, \“schemas\”:        [\“urn:ieff:params:scim:schemas:oracle:idcs:Settings\”],\“customBranding\”:        true,\“diagnosticLevel\”: 1,\“meta\”:        {\“resourceType\”:\“Settings\”}}”

In one embodiment, a “curl” command may be used to enabledata-view-level diagnostics from a “Settings” endpoint according to thefollowing example functionality:

-   -   curl -X PUT hostname:8990/admin/v1/Settings/Settings -H        “X-USER-IDENTITY-DOMAIN-NAME:TENANT1” -H “content-type:        application/json”—data “{\“id\”:\“Settings\”, \“schemas\”:        [\“urn:ieff:params:scim:schemas:oracle:idcs:Settings\”],\“customBranding\”:        true,\“diagnosticLevel\”: 2,\“meta\”:        {\“resourceType\”:\“Settings\”}}”

In one embodiment, a “curl” command may be used to enableservice-view-level diagnostics from a “Settings” endpoint according tothe following example functionality:

-   -   curl -X PUT hostname:8990/admin/v1/Settings/Settings -H        “X-USER-IDENTITY-DOMAIN-NAME:TENANT1” -H “content-type:        application/json”—data “{\“id\”:\“Settings\”, \“schemas\”:        [\“urn:ieff:params:scim:schemas:oracle:idcs:Settings\”],\“customBranding\”:        true,\“diagnosticLevel\”: 3,\“meta\”:        {\“resourceType\”:\“Settings\”}}”

In one embodiment, a “curl” command may be used to disable diagnostics(e.g., LEVEL=NONE or diagnosticLevel=0) from a “Settings” endpointaccording to the following example functionality:

curl -X PUT hostname:8990/admin/v1/Settings/Settings -H“X-USER-IDENTITY-DOMAIN-NAME:TENANT1” -H “content-type:application/json”—data “{\“id\”:\“Settings\”, \“schemas\”:[\“urn:ieff:params:scim:schemas:oracle:idcs:Settings\”],\“customBranding\”:true,\“diagnosticLevel\”: 0,\“meta\”: {\“resourceType\”:\“Settings\”}}”

In one embodiment, a tenant may consume the diagnostics framework byidentifying important flows in their functional module, implementingcorresponding code for diagnostics functionality, enabling thediagnostics, executing the flow, and collecting the logs. In oneembodiment, important flows may include, for example, a flow or use casethat requires certain configuration settings by customer or by thesystem (where the configuration settings can be missed), a flow or usecase that requires certain pre-steps to be performed as part of theon-boarding exercise, a flow that can be tenant-dependent oruser-dependent, a flow with settings that tenants can miss to follow andwhich can affect an important functionality, etc. Examples of such flowsare importing users and groups, synchronizing users and groups from anAD bridge, first time login use cases, use cases related to “changepassword” and “forgot password,” and flows that can be affected bynotifications settings and/or identity provider settings.

In one embodiment, after identifying important flows in their functionalmodule, the tenant may implement corresponding code for diagnosticsfunctionality. In one embodiment, IDCS components/services implement thefollowing functionalities to perform diagnostics recording:

-   -   DiagnosticLogger        diagnosticLogger=DiagnosticLogger.getLogger(“Service or Endpoint        name”)        This functionality may be implemented once at the beginning of a        functional flow, similar to a logger object (an object used to        log messages for a specific system or application component).    -   diagnosticLogger.entry(arguments/parameters)        This functionality may be invoked once on entry to a functional        flow to be diagnosed.    -   diagnosticLogger.info(message)        This functionality may be invoked any number of times in a        functional flow to record diagnostic messages.    -   diagnosticLogger.exit(return value)        This functionality may be invoked at the end of a functional        flow and return a value or a message.    -   diagnosticLogger.throwing(throwable object)        This functionality may be invoked any time when a thrown        functional exception needs to be recorded.    -   diagnosticLogger.caught(message, throwable object) This        functionality may be invoked any time when a functional        exception is caught and needs to be recorded with a message.

In one embodiment, after identifying important flows in a functionalmodule and implementing corresponding code for diagnosticsfunctionality, the tenant may enable the diagnostics functionality,execute a flow, and collect logs. In one embodiment, the tenant mayreview the logs internally in their team. In one embodiment, the tenantmay try to create problem scenarios (e.g., incorrect settings, etc.) andsee if the logs are actually spitting relevant information fordebugging. In one embodiment, the tenant may send the logs for review bythe architects and/or a scrum master for final review and forimplementing changes if required. Scrum is an iterative and incrementalagile software development framework for managing product development.The tenant may then upload the changes.

FIG. 16 is a flow diagram 1600 of the operation of IAM functionality inaccordance with an embodiment. In one embodiment, the functionality ofthe flow diagram of FIG. 16 is implemented by software stored in memoryor other computer readable or tangible medium, and executed by aprocessor. In other embodiments, the functionality may be performed byhardware (e.g., through the use of an application specific integratedcircuit (“ASIC”), a programmable gate array (“PGA”), a fieldprogrammable gate array (“FPGA”), etc.), or any combination of hardwareand software.

At 1602 a UI is provided to a tenant of an identity-management service,and at 1604 diagnostics functionality is enabled for the tenant based ona user input received via the UI. In one embodiment, the diagnosticsfunctionality allows for a user in the tenant to configure and receivediagnostics reports related to the identity-management service.

At 1606 a request is received for the identity-management service, at1608 a microservice is accessed based on the request, and at 1610 theidentity-management service is performed by the microservice. Forexample, in one embodiment, a variety of applications/services 602 maymake HTTP calls to IDCS APIs to use IDCS microservices 614 asillustrated in FIG. 6 and as described herein with reference to the IDCS“API platform” and accessing microservices in IDCS middle tier 614 inFIG. 6. In one embodiment, the microservice is a self-contained modulethat can communicate with other modules/microservices, and eachmicroservice has an unnamed universal port that can be contacted byothers. In one embodiment, the request is authenticated by a securitygate such as Cloud Gate as described herein, for example, with referenceto web-routing tier 610 in FIG. 6 and/or cloud gate 702 in FIG. 7.

At 1612 diagnostics information is collected and recorded during theperforming of the identity-management service, and at 1614 thediagnostics information is displayed to the user via the UI.

In one embodiment, the enabling of the diagnostics functionality for thetenant allows for the user in the tenant to configure and receive thediagnostics reports related to the tenant but does not allow the user toconfigure or receive other diagnostics reports related to other tenantsthat use the microservice. In one embodiment, the diagnosticsfunctionality is disabled for the tenant based on another user inputreceived via the UI.

In one embodiment, the microservice is stateless and performs theidentity-management service using data stored in a remote cache. In oneembodiment, the remote cache includes a distributed data grid, and theremote cache and the microservice are configured to scale independentlyof one another. In one embodiment, the remote cache implements adifferent namespace for each tenant that uses the microservice.

In one embodiment, the diagnostics functionality is implemented by adiagnostics client and a diagnostics server. In one embodiment, thediagnostics client is invoked by the microservice. In one embodiment,the diagnostics server runs on an administration microservice. In oneembodiment, communication between the diagnostics client and thediagnostics server is performed over REST protocol using anauthentication token with administrative level privileges. In oneembodiment, the diagnostics client collects the diagnostics informationand pushes it to the diagnostics server. In one embodiment, thediagnostics server saves the diagnostics information in a storage.

In one embodiment, upon determining that the user wants to access thediagnostics information, the UI makes a corresponding call to thediagnostics service, and the diagnostics service performs a search onthe stored diagnostics information and provides the required informationto the UI. In one embodiment, each entry in the diagnostics informationincludes a timestamp and an execution-context identifier ECID, and arelationship identifier RID. In one embodiment, each entry in thediagnostics information further includes an actor name if applicable. Inone embodiment, a traffic director generates the ECID for the request,wherein the ECID uniquely identifies the request.

In one embodiment, the request forms the root of a tree of sub-tasksthat need to be completed for the request. In one embodiment, the RIDincludes an ordered set of numbers that describes a location of a taskin the tree of sub-tasks. In one embodiment, the diagnostics informationrelates to the sub-task.

As disclosed, embodiments provide a multi-tenant identity cloud servicewhere each tenant may configure self-service diagnostics/debugging. Oneembodiment provides the capability to enable/disable diagnostics flowsper tenant. In one embodiment, for example, in case of an issue duringruntime, a tenant administrator may enable diagnostics for the tenant,execute a use case, disable diagnostics, view and download the logs,infer what could be issue in the use case, and try to fix the issueaccordingly.

Several embodiments are specifically illustrated and/or describedherein. However, it will be appreciated that modifications andvariations of the disclosed embodiments are covered by the aboveteachings and within the purview of the appended claims withoutdeparting from the spirit and intended scope of the invention.

What is claimed is:
 1. A non-transitory computer readable medium havinginstructions stored thereon that, when executed by a processor, causethe processor to provide cloud-based identity and access management, theproviding comprising: providing a user interface (UI) to a tenant of anidentity-management service; enabling diagnostics functionality for thetenant based on a user input received via the UI, wherein thediagnostics functionality allows for a user in the tenant to configureand receive diagnostics reports related to the identity-managementservice; receiving a request for the identity-management service;accessing a microservice based on the request; performing theidentity-management service by the microservice; collecting andrecording diagnostics information during the performing of theidentity-management service; and displaying the diagnostics informationto the user via the UI.
 2. The computer readable medium of claim 1,wherein the enabling of the diagnostics functionality for the tenantallows for the user in the tenant to configure and receive thediagnostics reports related to the tenant but does not allow the user toconfigure or receive other diagnostics reports related to other tenantsthat use the microservice.
 3. The computer readable medium of claim 1,the providing further comprising disabling the diagnostics functionalityfor the tenant based on another user input received via the UI.
 4. Thecomputer readable medium of claim 1, wherein the microservice isstateless, wherein the microservice performs the identity-managementservice using data stored in a remote cache, wherein the remote cachecomprises a distributed data grid, wherein the remote cache and themicroservice are configured to scale independently of one another. 5.The computer readable medium of claim 4, wherein the remote cacheimplements a different namespace for each tenant that uses themicroservice.
 6. The computer readable medium of claim 1, wherein thediagnostics functionality is implemented by a diagnostics client and adiagnostics server, wherein the diagnostics client is invoked by themicroservice, wherein the diagnostics server runs on an administrationmicroservice.
 7. The computer readable medium of claim 6, whereincommunication between the diagnostics client and the diagnostics serveris performed over Representational State Transfer (REST) protocol usingan authentication token with administrative level privileges.
 8. Thecomputer readable medium of claim 6, wherein the diagnostics clientcollects the diagnostics information and pushes it to the diagnosticsserver, wherein the diagnostics server saves the diagnostics informationin a storage.
 9. The computer readable medium of claim 8, wherein, upondetermining that the user wants to access the diagnostics information,the UI makes a corresponding call to the diagnostics service, whereinthe diagnostics service performs a search on the stored diagnosticsinformation and provides the required information to the UI.
 10. Thecomputer readable medium of claim 1, wherein each entry in thediagnostics information includes a timestamp and an execution-contextidentifier ECID, and a relationship identifier RID, wherein each entryin the diagnostics information further includes an actor name ifapplicable.
 11. The computer readable medium of claim 10, wherein atraffic director generates the ECID for the request, wherein the ECIDuniquely identifies the request.
 12. The computer readable medium ofclaim 10, wherein the request forms the root of a tree of sub-tasks thatneed to be completed for the request, wherein the RID comprises anordered set of numbers that describes a location of a task in the treeof sub-tasks, wherein the diagnostics information relates to thesub-task.
 13. A method of cloud-based identity and access management,comprising: providing a user interface (UI) to a tenant of anidentity-management service; enabling diagnostics functionality for thetenant based on a user input received via the UI, wherein thediagnostics functionality allows for a user in the tenant to configureand receive diagnostics reports related to the identity-managementservice; receiving a request for the identity-management service;accessing a microservice based on the request; performing theidentity-management service by the microservice; collecting andrecording diagnostics information during the performing of theidentity-management service; and displaying the diagnostics informationto the user via the UI.
 14. The method of claim 13, wherein the enablingof the diagnostics functionality for the tenant allows for the user inthe tenant to configure and receive the diagnostics reports related tothe tenant but does not allow the user to configure or receive otherdiagnostics reports related to other tenants that use the microservice.15. The method of claim 13, the providing further comprising disablingthe diagnostics functionality for the tenant based on another user inputreceived via the UI.
 16. The method of claim 13, wherein themicroservice is stateless, wherein the microservice performs theidentity-management service using data stored in a remote cache, whereinthe remote cache comprises a distributed data grid, wherein the remotecache and the microservice are configured to scale independently of oneanother.
 17. The method of claim 16, wherein the remote cache implementsa different namespace for each tenant that uses the microservice. 18.The method of claim 13, wherein the diagnostics functionality isimplemented by a diagnostics client and a diagnostics server, whereinthe diagnostics client is invoked by the microservice, wherein thediagnostics server runs on an administration microservice.
 19. Themethod of claim 18, wherein communication between the diagnostics clientand the diagnostics server is performed over Representational StateTransfer (REST) protocol using an authentication token withadministrative level privileges.
 20. A system for cloud-based identityand access management, comprising: a providing module that provides auser interface (UI) to a tenant of an identity-management service; anenabling module that enables diagnostics functionality for the tenantbased on a user input received via the UI, wherein the diagnosticsfunctionality allows for a user in the tenant to configure and receivediagnostics reports related to the identity-management service; areceiving module that receives a request for the identity-managementservice; an accessing module that accesses a microservice based on therequest; a performing module that performs the identity-managementservice by the microservice; a collecting and recording module thatcollects and records diagnostics information during the performing ofthe identity-management service; and a displaying module that displaysthe diagnostics information to the user via the UI.